


For Hearth And Home

by xikra1648



Category: Final Fantasy XV
Genre: Action/Adventure, Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Drama, F/M, Female Reader, Galahdan Reader, Gen, Humor, Language, Magic, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Other Ships Not Mentioned in Tags, Platonic Female/Male Relationships, Platonic Relationships, Reader description already set, Road Trips, Romance, will be added later
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-06-12
Updated: 2019-07-02
Packaged: 2020-05-02 07:17:08
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 9
Words: 21,876
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19194262
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/xikra1648/pseuds/xikra1648
Summary: You'd never claim that you ever had everything figured out, but you had enough figured out that you weren't scrambling for answers and kept a level head when everything went wrong - as it always did.  Even if you had to make some difficult decisions, you knew enough to feel comfortable that you were doing the right thing.  Then the treaty, more importantly the attack on Insomnia, left you baffled with questions you'd never even thought you'd have to ask - literally none of them having to do with the war that had dictated your entire life even before you joined the Kingsglaive.Why, in the middle of Niflheim's attack on Insomnia, had King Regis taken away the magic he'd gifted you?  More importantly...why could you still use magic after he'd taken it away?You wouldn't have such a hard time trying to find answers if you weren't on a road trip with your ex and friends you hadn't talked to in two years...





	1. Another Day, Another Clusterfuck

**Author's Note:**

> So, I rewatched Kingsglaive cause 1) it’s an amazing movie and 2) to cement where I want things to be in this fic and I’d just like to say that Lena Headley as Lunafreya and Sean Bean as King Regis is really throwing me off. Not cause it’s different from the game – if I’m being completely honest I prefer Lena as Luna and Sean as Regis – but because I’m also a big Game of Thrones fan despite how the show ended. I mean, in GoT Lena’s character Cersei is, without a doubt, a villainous character and Sean’s character Ned is the good guy that puts all other good guys to shame. Now, Lena plays Cersei so amazingly well that it gets hard to hate her sometimes, and even when you do hate her you still respect her, and you remember how she ended up where she is and that the world turned her bitter and cruel, but that doesn’t change the fact she plays the character that acts as an antagonist for most of the series.
> 
> She does amazing as Luna, amazing enough that I prefer her despite the fact that Amy Shiels killed it as Luna in the game and DLC, but it still gave me a touch of whiplash for a sec.

# For Hearth And Home

### Another Day, Another Clusterfuck

 

This was a clusterfuck and a half.

Niflheim’s Magitechs, airships, and fucking _fiends_ were at the wall lining the Lucian boarder.  Niflheim had been spending so much time and energy taking up Lucis’ former territories that they were only just reaching the boarder wall.  There was still some distance between the majority of the Empire’s forces, giving the other mages some – but only just _some_ – time to finish casting the massive storm that was supposed to block the single passageway across the seemingly bottomless ravine between the Niflheim forces and the old – _medieval –_ fortress blocking access to the rest of the country.  You were at the west end, using magic to repair the stone wall that enemy forces had breached only seconds before Nyx and a handful of other warriors arrived to continue pushing the fiends back so you could be dispatched to repair the wall.

It was looking like the black funnel-cloud of smoke you were casting with the other mages was progressing quickly, red embers dancing through the black clouds, you hadn’t thought answering the request to patch up the wall would slow progress down so much.  There were six of you total, while there weren’t enough of you to have ranks of authority beyond the Captain, and of course the king, you’d only been a Glaive since you graduated high school three-ish years ago.  The rest of them had joined years before you, some of them had been mages for an entire decade.  Yeah, it was an ambitious spell considering you’d been fighting for _days_ and magic restoratives like Ethers and Elixirs were running low, but you figured they’d be fine without you for just a bit.

 _“What’s the hold-up Crowe?”_ Libertus snapped over coms as the Empire’s fiends and soldiers got closer and closer.

 _“We’re a woman short – no!”_ You heard a thump over the open comms, one of the other girls must have passed out from casting spells non-stop for days without rest.  _“[Y/N]!  Get back here now!”_

 _“Not unless that wall’s back up!  They’re breaking into the east end and we can’t risk them just walking in through the west too!”_   Tredd barked, as if reminding the rest of you that the Imps had moved their attention to the east after a wave of hurriedly patched-up warriors warped back onto the field to cover the west end.

 _“If we don’t get her up here now, there’s a chance we won’t finish the spell in time to block them,”_ Crowe reminded the rest of you of what failing at that spell meant.

 _“What’s the status on the wall, [Y/N]?”_ Luche cut in, pulling you into the debate as it was _your_ position in question.

“Not done yet, but it’ll hold long enough for me to jump into the spell from here!”  You took a few steps back, mapping your way up the old tower, before taking a running jump and clambering up the stone wall and crossing the top of the tower to get as close to the spell as you could.  With the excess distance you were going to need to do a bit of searching before you found the magical frequency of the spell, then you’d have to resonate with the other mages, but you’d had a knack for spellwork since day one.  A fiery tornado was hardly anything the six of you hadn’t done before.

Except…something was a bit different this time.

You felt the spell starting to slip away as soon as you latched on, bracing yourself and reaching out towards the dark clouds as you’d been trained, and felt something sort of… _snap_.  At the time you figured it was your temper, but looking back it didn’t quite fit.  Besides, as far as you knew the list of people whose mood could affect their magic _only_ contained the names of the Lucis royal family.  The people that were _born_ with magic.  That was _it._

“Oh, no you _don’t!”_ you snarled at the waning spell, gestures fluid but unmatched by anything the other mages were doing, as you felt your hands tensing like you were actually _physically_ grabbing the thing, before throwing your arms down so hard you ended up crouching down for a moment, like you were physically _slamming_ the funnel down onto the ground.  It hit hard too, the molten orange and red of the fire mixed into the spell engulfing the bottom of the fiery tornado as unexpected shocks of lightning reached out in jagged branches and struck the nearby Imps you and the other mages had cast the spell over.

_“All Glaives fall back.  Repeat.  All Glaives fall back.”_

That had always been the plan.  Launch the equivalent of a magical nuclear deterrent and get the fuck out of there before you got caught in it, but as the order was relayed through the Glaive issue Bluetooth earpiece hooked around your ear, and you tossed the hood of your mages uniform down, you couldn’t help but freeze for a moment and watch as the funnel cloud expanded at a rate that hadn’t been expected.  You and the other mages had cast this very same spell dozens of times over the last three years.  It shouldn’t be growing this quickly, it had never done that before.  Not even when you had all six mages in good shape.

This time, you had one unconscious mage and five exhausted mages, most of which on their way to losing consciousness themselves.

You turned to follow the retreat order, away from the battle, when you felt like the entire world had frozen.

It was just for a moment, the world slowed down, and you heard… _something._   A voice, but it wasn’t clear at all, like a sound underwater.

_Ee…Ee what?  Ee…_

_Shit!  The wall!_

The east wall was still struggling, in a worse state than the west end from what you were hearing over coms, when the spell had been finished.  Repairing it would be useless at the moment, but reinforcements were heading that way and there was a chance they’d fall to the very spell their comrades – you included – had cast.  The other mages were holding the spell now that the hard part was over, you shifted your stance and pulled away before making your way over the rubble and dust of the old fortress, hopping and climbing around on light feet – Nyx had teased you for being a _little monkey_ when you were a kid – as you sprinted to the east end of the wall, picking your steps to allow you to safely hop down and cover the warriors that hadn’t escaped behind the walls yet.

That’s when you saw it.

The biggest daemon you’d ever seen.

It didn’t even look like it had a physical form.  Pointy and jagged limbs, massive shoulders, standing on two feet and easily taller than some buildings back in Insomnia, its red eyes glowing like they were made out of a curse made physical, lines and sparks of red like molten lava was hiding behind the eerie _fog_ coating its body.  You stood on the ground, exactly where the mages were _not_ supposed to be, watching in a horrified awe as it crashed into the spell the other mages were holding before just _snuffing it out_ as it slammed down against the dusty ground.

With the loss of the spell, and the fact the imps could have only unleashed their daemon after sundown, an eerie gray darkness had settled over the dry and dusty edge of Lucian boarders, making the jaws the daemon was opening all the more noticeable.  They _looked_ like jaws anyway, like the damn thing was covered in jaws, each one containing multiple glowing red and orange orbs of varying sized, but each one _dwarfing_ the average moving van.  It showered glowing orange projectiles at the field, hundreds and hundreds of car-sized rocks heated just short of the point where they’d melt.

_“We can’t take down that daemon.  I’m ordering a full retreat, get back here alive.  For hearth and home.”_

“Come on!  Come on!” you hollered as you held a glimmering _Protega_ above to give the retreating warriors at least some cover, looking back over the field to see if anyone was left behind as Nyx had just passed by.

_“All units, fall back to the extraction point.  Support is inbound.”_

“Shit, Nyx!” you snatched his sleeve with your free hand and turned his attention towards Libertus where he was stuck under one of the rocks that daemon had fired at the warriors on the field.

“We have to get out of here!”  Pelna skidded to a halt when he dashed past the two of you and realized neither of you were going anywhere, just staring out at the field where Libertus was pinned under a bolder too big to move on his own.  “We have _orders!”_

You and Nyx shared a single look before he unsheathed one of his kukris and tossed it to you before the two of you slipped out of the small cover offered by the entryway to the fortress and warped over to Libertus as another daemon – smaller than the first – closed in.  It was a literal Cerberus.  Giant, three heads, and most importantly it breathed fire, drooled lava, and had equally hot claws.

You couldn’t remember exactly who had made this exclamation, but he was right.  Lucis was _not_ paying you enough to be dealing with this shit.

Where in the fuck had that fiend come from?  That ugly-ass bug on stilts was gonna have to wait its goddamn turn, cause you and Nyx were a bit busy ducking and dodging around the giant three-headed dog trying to eat you.  Or him.  Or both of you.  Or maybe just barbeque you.

It’s a crazy job, but the running punchline was that King Regis had actively sought out volunteers from Galahd not only because you were all shockingly sensitive to magic, but because you were also _batshit crazy_ enough to _do_ the fucking job.

Didn’t seem to matter that you’d been living in the crown city for the last decade.  You’d spent the most formative years of your life in Galahd and lived in an apartment complex with a bunch of other Galahd refugees.  You were what could only be described as _Galahd crazy._

“Shit!” you backflipped through the air as you snatched the kukri you were borrowing from Nyx before tossing it again to dodge another attack.  The fiend had been easy pickings, a few well-placed shocks of lightning from you and Nyx and the bug from hell had no legs and got squashed by the three-headed doom-dog.  To top things off, the natural bridge over the ravine was losing strength, it had taken far too many big hits from that bolder-spitting daemon, and the ground was literally crumbling underneath you.

Nyx managed to get to Libertus’ side, about to warp the two of them to safety before the literal daemon dog pounced on the ground nearby and the already broken bridge just kept on breaking.  You managed to warp to safer ground, but that damn thing was still right on Nyx and Libertus’ tails.  One good push and it would fall down the ravine, probably to never be seen again.

You held the kukri by biting down on the hilt, quickly formed a Blizzaga between both your palms and not even bothering with a weaker version of the spell, moving your hands in circular motions to roll it around and make sure it was evened out, before using your entire body to launch it at the daemon with both hands.  The spell burst into gusts and waves of ice as your comrades clambered their way to safety, and the daemon clawed and scraped for purchase in a deep panic as the blizzard was overpowering the magma and living fire in its three mouths and freezing the damn thing over as it started to finally tip over the edge of the broken bridge and take a long and inevitably fatal trip to the bottom of the ravine.

The three of you didn’t even have time to check on each other when you’d regrouped on stable ground, the first daemon the imps had dropped on you was walking along the bottom of the ravine and still looking over the top of the fortress.  The three of you could only watch, frozen, as the Glaives still had yet to completely retreat and the daemon stared down directly at the fortress, letting out an otherworldly cry.

Getting out of there alive was going to take a damn _miracle_.

It would probably be a good idea to start believing in miracles…


	2. Peace Talks Aren't Supposed To Be Foreboding

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, by the time I was only half-way through this chapter as I have a rule that I must have at least three complete chapters before I’m allowed to post it on AO3, I had over 20 pages with Post-It note additions (and still haven’t finished writing out the entire plan, though I do have the big parts of the ending we’re working towards worked out) of hand-written notes, rewatched Kingsglaive, reread ‘Final Fantasy XV Prologue Parting Ways,’ and even gone through ‘Final Fantasy XV – The Dawn Of The Future –‘ for inspiration as the last four DLC were basically supposed to be the equivalent of the ‘true ending,’ and this novel was written by a member of the team that was working on the Ardyn and cancelled DLC to basically tell us what was SUPPOSED to happen. Like other Final Fantasy games, you’ve got the base ending – which is also the bad ending in this one – and the better ending in the Ignis DLC, but they’re not the ‘true ending’ where you fight the REAL villain of the story.
> 
> For those of you that came over here because I cancelled Last Of The Real Ones, I basically wanted you to know that so you know I’m not just dumping this one. I’ve already put too much work in this one. It might take time to complete, because it’s a massive project and will involve replaying FFXV, all replaying all the DLC, and watching YouTube playthroughs of some of the temporary events like the Assassin’s Festival and, yes, even the Moogle Chocobo Festival. On top of that there’s a load of original stuff that I have to write as a result of going off-canon at a point (not saying where cause spoilers). I still feel bad for teasing you guys like that before I’d even gotten anywhere and then out of nowhere ‘BOOM,’ it’s all over.
> 
> I feel bad cause I’m a massive Firefly/Serenity fan, and still haven’t recovered. I know my stuff isn’t nearly as good, but I still feel bad.

# For Hearth And Home

### Peace Talks Aren't Supposed To Be Foreboding

 

_“Don’t fool yourself.  Whatever strength you have is on loan from the king.  You are nothing without him.”_

Just because Drautos led the Glaives didn’t mean you had to _like_ him.

He’d always struck you as an asshole, and the fact that he’d shot that little insult at you and Nyx while chewing you out for saving Libertus was just another reason to add to the list of reasons why you couldn’t stand him.  Yes, you’d defied a direct order to retreat, but you’d done it to save a fellow Glaive and stop a daemon that was going to pursue you all the way to the extraction zone.

You still couldn’t believe he’d decided to focus on being a dick about you and Nyx going back for Libertus instead of looking into the _real issue._

The Empire’s daemon was staring you all down, they had hours of night left, but they just packed up their daemons and _left._

They had a majority of the Kingsglaive dead to rights and they just _left_.

If _any_ opponent did that, it would be unnerving, but Niflheim was notoriously two-faced and back-handed.  There was a reason for this, and as much as you wanted to relax in the fact that the miracle you’d all needed to survive had actually happened, you couldn’t help but feel like the whole thing was just for show.  Like they were showing off what they _could_ do, and then decided not to do it.  That way they could hold it over King Regis’ head and get what they wanted.

The ride back in the transport van was quiet, the reality of what the transport vehicles were cementing in that you were _dirty refugees._   You all just _happened_ to have a purpose, so they’d give you some gray industrial vans with four chairs in the back and absolutely no seatbelts.  Even counting the driver’s seat and front passenger’s seat there wouldn’t be enough seats to prevent people from sitting on the floor.

You leaned back against the partition between the back of the van and the front, seated on the metal floor with one leg stretched out and another bent at the knee to rest your arm holding your phone as you listened to the music being relayed through your earbuds, looking at one of the Glaives curled up on the floor sleeping, and just like that you felt like you were in the trailer of a semi-truck transporting you and a bunch of other victims of Niflheim’s invasion of Galahd trying to get to safety.  Desperate enough, poor and destitute enough, that your only option was paying a guy that was treating you more like _cargo_ than _people._ To be completely honest, the only difference was it was a line of identical vans and tired Glaives returning from battle.

When Drautos meted out your and Nyx’s punishment for defying orders, you lucked out.  While there was nothing keeping the captain from sticking Nyx at the gates, stuck with the gate patrols miles away from the heavily populated city of Insomnia where nothing was more abundantly supplied than a distaste for immigrants and refugees. 

You’d lucked out, as had the gate patrols you’d inevitably set on fire because the Kingsglaive was made up entirely of those immigrants and refugees’ people just loved to hate.  The fact of the matter was that there weren’t nearly as many mages as there were warriors, and every mage had a different level of endurance when it came to spellcasting and continued use of magic.  Your endurance was hardly _endless_ , but it was not only the highest, it was easily _far_ higher than any of the others.  As much as Drautos wanted to stick you on a shit job like gate patrol, he knew he couldn’t afford to do so.

The first thing you did as you descended the metal stairs of the pedestrian bridge into the lower levels of the city was unclip the reddish orange cape from your cropped uniform jacket before slipping off your jacket as well, draping the two of them over your arm and leaving you in your sleeveless black bodysuit and thigh-high heeled boots.  You waved and smiled to a few people, walking down the walkway lined in shops and stalls set up by the immigrants from multiple Lucian territories escaping the war and trying to make a life for themselves.  Most of the employees there had picked up the job after finding out they didn’t have the ability to use the King’s magic, it wasn’t just up to him who he gave magic too as it was a fickle power, and Glaives tended to have a special place in the neighborhood.  It had nothing to do with the magic and everything to do with the fact that _you_ were the ones at the front lines of the fight against Niflheim, the very force who had chased these people from their homes in the first place.

You stopped at a bar you and the others frequented, either to pick up chilled six-packs or have some drinks, and picked up your usual six-pack as you dug into the smaller of the two packs strapped to your thigh.

“Nyx come by yet?”

“Nah, not yet, everyone else has though,” the owner answered as he pulled the chilled six-pack you’d requested out of the fridge behind the bar and placed it on the counter to ring it up.

“I’m gonna need a second one, then,” you nodded towards the pack already on the counter as you counted the bills in your hand and asked, “Mind keeping a beer in the fridge for him?  If his day’s been anything like mine, he’s gonna need it.”

“You got it.”  He slipped one of the bottles from the second six-pack and slipped it into the fridge under the bar before adding the second pack to your tab.  You handed him some cash, telling him to keep the few gill in change for doing you a favor, before tucking the rest of your cash back into your pack and zip it up.  You kept your jacket and cape safely draped over your arm as you carried the two packs – one missing a bottle already – as you made your way further down the street only yards above the dark city floor.

The lighting in this area was dim at any time of the day, though unlike daytime you had no clear view of the sky at night, but none of that seemed to matter.  It was part of the aura that filled the street, it carried the same kind of spirit as the people there, patchwork and taking what they had to make the best of things.  Bare bulbs on strings draped along the concrete walls of buildings and structural supports kept the street lit at all times, colorful cloths draped over stalls as a makeshift roof, indoor shops with their doors left open and music playing from a radio on the counter, some shops only had a widow where you’d speak with the shop keeper or one of the short-order cooks, any restaurants were outside with a few tables or a single dinner table, the voices of people talking among each other mixing with radios at stall shops or shop windows playing various radio channels all mixing together in a sound that was purely unique to this one singular street in Insomnia.

“Hey!” you called out as you took a few light steps down the short staircase onto the platform the restaurant was on and passed by the one smaller table surrounded by stools on your way to the larger table where almost everyone else had already made themselves comfortable.  It had been one hell of a few days, and you’d all decided it was time to go out for food and drinks after your shifts were over.  Granted, Libertus was temporarily off-duty for a bit since his leg was broken, but he’d be back and hobbling around the headquarters on crutches as he helped out with general bookkeeping until he was cleared for field duty again.

Crowe caught sight of you and smiled in greeting before ordering some food for you too.  You placed the two six-packs onto the table, immediately attacked by the guys as some of them even chugged their open beer before reaching for another one as you yanked your uniform gloves off and took a seat.

“See anything interesting on TV?” Libertus teased as you grabbed a bottle of beer for yourself.  He was referring to your _remedial assignment_.  Punishment for defying orders in the field.  You’d been ordered, until further notice, to work with the guards watching the security cameras in public areas of the Citadel.  These weren’t the _Crownsguard_ , mind you, but the guys who didn’t meet the high standards for the Crownsguard and signed up for Citadel Security.  Some of them legitimately did it because they accepted that they couldn’t get into the Crownsguard but still wanted to serve, a commendable attitude, but most of them pretended it was the ‘same thing’ and they were ‘just as good.’

It wasn’t.

They weren’t.

And most of them were immigrant hating assholes that didn’t say anything because they were in the office and would get in trouble if they were heard.  They didn’t like you were there, you didn’t like you were there, they made sure you knew you weren’t welcome, and to top things off you had to maintain the steely professional mask every Glaive was trained to wear around the Citadel.  You could take off the mask in the Glaive headquarters, assuming there was nobody visiting, and certainly in the transports or during an operation, but anyone outside the Glaives had expectations of you.  You were still allowed to _blink_ , but human emotions and expressions were _strictly_ not allowed.

“There was a spider on one of the cameras and I just about launched a fireball at the screen when I saw it, just…” you cringed and shuddered just at the thought, squeezing your big almond shaped eyes as you tried to think of more pleasant thoughts to chase away the thought of the unwanted close-up of that spider stretching across the entire screen.  The soft and rounded curves of your thick, plump lips were still turned in a grimace when you opened your dark brown eyes, twisting off the cap of your beer bottle before taking a swig in the hopes of washing away the memory with booze as the others laughed.

“Any idea how long you’ll be stuck on that detail?” Crowe asked as she brought the kebabs over to the table for everyone to dig into, Pelna downing the rest of the liquor in his cup before getting back up to get a refill at the window.

“Drautos didn’t say, probably until he can’t afford to keep me there anymore, but better there than the gate,” you answered as you grabbed a kebab for yourself, long braid swaying a bit as you leaned forward against the table.  You caught sight of Nyx making his way down the stairs and nodded his way in a casual greeting, letting the others know he was there, “Speak of the unlucky duck.”

Nyx had clearly had a long day, holding his uniform jacket draped over his shoulder and gloves tucked into the pockets of his jacket as he took another swig of beer.

“Hey!  Rough day on the gate, huh Glaive?” Libertus teased, barely able to get a laugh out before Crowe cut him off.

“You jerk, it’s your fault he got stuck there.”  She smacked Libertus on his cast, and you just couldn’t help but be a little shit.

“Crowe,” you feigned a whine, “Libertus picked on me for watching the cameras all day.”

She smacked him twice more as she got up and you couldn’t help your smirk and snickers, you were too amused to bother with Nyx for rolling his eyes.  You’d fully admit you took advantage of being the baby of the group sometimes, but you only did it if it was harmless and would get a laugh.

“Not a very nice welcome for a big hero.”  He stepped around Crowe as she took a look at his t-shirt, the gray lines depicting a blade down the center of a symmetrical column-like design.

“Not a very nice _outfit_ for one, either” she retorted, sitting back down as Nyx made his way around the table to the last empty seat, Luche getting up to lean against the railing and look across the deep drop to the drainage ditch before looking back up to the glittering city streets above.

“It could’ve been worse, they barely noticed me past the beer,” you offered lightheartedly as Nyx stepped behind your seat and draped his jacket over the railing surrounding the platform before picking up Libertus’ jacket from the only unoccupied stool, he and Crowe sitting down as Libertus started to complain about the food.  Yeah, you’d admit it wasn’t as good as the traditional recipe, but it wasn’t _terrible_.  At least not bad enough to make a fuss, especially when everyone was hungry and tired.

“You put booze in front of them, what did you expect?” Nyx chuckled, noticing there was something sticking out of Libertus’ jacket pocket as he held onto the jacket for the injured Glaive, peering down at the white bottle.

“I dunno, a _hello_ would have been nice.”

“Hey Libertus,” Crowe snatched his attention before he did more than just accuse the man for selling out Galahdan heritage for gill, “You thank Nyx and [Y/N] for saving your life yet?”

“Oh, come on, Crowe, we’re too close for that,” Libertus brushed it off, and to be fair he had a point.  Everyone at the table had saved each other’s asses too many times to count.  Still, you got where Crowe was coming from, a _thank you_ was technically the polite thing to do.  “They help me, I help them, that’s the way it’s always been.”

“Looks like you got a little help from something else, huh?”  Nyx held up his childhood friend’s jacket, revealing the white bottle of Olesaurare, and based on the lack of prescription label it was doubtful he got it through _conventional_ methods.

The injured Glaive snatched his jacket and covered up the bottle once again before laying his jacket on his lap and argued, “I need all I can get.”

“That stuff messes with your head, how do you even know it’s helping?” you countered, the argument cut off when Pelna came back with a few cups of liquor from the window.  _Fuck_ , between that and the beer you were all going to have one hell of a hangover.

“For hearth,” he toasted, raising his cup as the rest of you did the same, everyone joining in for the last half, “and home.”

It was an old saying from home, one that had gotten carried over to the Kingsglaive since it was primarily made up of Galahdans just trying to get some semblance of peace back.  It _sounded_ redundant, but while ‘hearth’ referred to a place, the place you lived, where you were from, ‘home’ was sort of understood to have more to do with _people_.  Your family, friends, loved ones, whoever you would fight for.

“So, Nyx the Gatekeeper,” Pelna started as you all lowered your mismatched cups onto the dusty table, “How’s the new post treating you?”

“Oh, it’s amazing, you guys would love it,” Nyx answered with a sarcasm dryer than most deserts, “The gate watch are real sweethearts.”

“Yeah right,” Pelna scoffed, voicing the unfortunate fact that the rest of you knew all too well, “We all know they hate us outsiders more than anything.  So bored, they’ve got nothing better to do.”

“Boredom’s nicer than being stuck in a warzone.”  You reached to the plate of kebabs on the table and grabbed another, tossing the stick of your last one onto the growing pile.

“I’d fight a hundred more wars for Galahdans to know boredom.”  Nyx shared your sentiment, you’d both joined the Glaives because you wanted to, but it wasn’t what you wanted to do _forever._   This was a _temporary_ job, once the war was over, you’d gladly give up your magic and turn in your uniform.  Maybe even go back to Galahd.  You didn’t know yet, but you’d figure it out.

“Just don’t go dying yet,” Pelna aimed at Nyx, raising his cup as if to make another toast, deadly serious, “I still owe you.  A lot.”

“Where would the Glaive be without it’s _hero_?” Libertus chimed in, further irritating you and Crowe.

“Every _fucking_ time,” you groaned as you rolled your eyes, tossing your head back briefly like you were using your entire body to roll your eyes.  Seriously, what was it with these guys and keeping score of who saved whom?  Just cover each other’s asses and call it even.

“Can you not talk like this while we’re drinking, please?” Crowe snapped, wanting to prevent everyone from falling into a deep and philosophical conversation as you all continued to drink.  You and Crowe had already gotten stuck dealing with that hell before, and promptly took off to get drinks with the other mages, and that was a _disaster_ of a night.  The two of you drank with the guys because it was _supposed_ to be more fun than drinking with the girls, if these idiots got deep and philosophical every time you were _screwed._   Though, Crowe lost you when she tried to give you all a reason why you should be celebrating.  “Besides, we sent the Nifs running with their tails between their legs, right?”

“They weren’t running from us,” Luche finally jumped in, leaning back against the railing as he drank and brooded, “No, they were toying with us.”

“Stop being such a buzzkill Luche, we all know what happened,” Nyx defended, wanting to talk about what happened about as much as the rest of you.

“Did you know they sent an envoy to the Citadel after that?” Luche countered, immediately catching your attention as you looked up with a furrowed brow.  That certainly explained why he’d been brooding more than usual.

“What for?  To offer their surrender?”

“After what happened on the last operation?” you scoffed at Libertus’ question, having trouble anyone could possibly believe that, “They were making a point, showing off their daemons to back the king into a corner.  That envoy was to tell King Regis either he gives them what they want, or they keep launching daemons like that big bastard at us.”

The others shot angry looks your way for even suggesting such a thing, save for Luche who had put the pieces together for himself when he found out about the Empire’s envoy, but the looks didn’t last for long as the truth settled over the table.

Niflheim had the advantage, and if the king had a trick up his sleeve it sure as hell wasn’t something any of you knew of.

You knew King Regis, you’d met him personally many times, and you knew he was far more clever than even Niflheim would expect, maybe even more so than Clarus Amicitia, the King’s Shield, knew.  He had to know he couldn’t trust Niflheim, he had to know they wouldn’t just let Lucis be.  The entire reason they’d invaded Tenebrae in the first place was to get to King Regis and Prince Noctis, who were there because Noctis barely survived a fiend attack on him and his mother, one that was awfully suspicious when coupled with the knowledge that Niflheim has had and used fiends as weapons for years.

The really scary part was, the prospect of fighting more daemons the size of the damn Citadel was less frightening than King Regis accepting whatever deal Niflheim offered.


	3. It's Been Two Years...

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Soo, in the canon timeline, Noctis leaves sometime between the announcement that King Regis accepted the peace offering and the day of the signing, but definitely before the Empire and Luna arrived. The timeline between him leaving and the treaty-signing-turned-attack is sort of fuzzy, partially to give some wiggle room for the camping/hotel/RV function of the game, and the Kingsglaive movie doesn’t do a whole lot in defining it. I mean, to be entirely fair, I camped multiple times before I reached the part in the story where the guys turn back the day after the attack, so they sort of have to leave that wiggle room there.
> 
> However, he can’t possibly leave before the announcement because the announcement was probably made right after the decision was made and Noctis might not even know the details involved in the proposed treaty, let alone be ready to leave. There’s also the detail that Noct is leaving his car for the Glaives to use and taking the Regalia, and Drautos was only able to make the decision that he’d ask to use Noct’s Audi after the decision was finalized. Furthermore, in the official prologue ‘Parting Ways,’ since Noct is at the Citadel cause he had to pack up stuff in his room and drop off his car, Nyx legit drives him home. Like, that’s just canon.
> 
> BASICALLY, I have wiggle room and I’m fucking using it, even though this is a fanfic and obvious AU given the premise, but whatever.

# For Hearth And Home

### It's Been Two Years...

 

_“Things were hectic in the capital today as the Lucian government announced full acceptance of what some are criticizing as the unilateral peace terms proposed by Chancellor Izunia of Niflheim.  The signing of the truth will see power over all Lucian territories transferred to the empire, with the sole exception of Insomnia.  In return, Niflheim guarantees the continued safety of Insomnia and its citizenry, as well as cessation to all hostilities, bringing a decisive end to this long and bitter war.”_

The television in the armory to the open-air training court echoed, everyone in the room growing silent as you listened, and your worst fears were realized.

Even after Drautos ordered everyone to the briefing room, reassigning you and Nyx to the Castle Guard and ordering Crowe to speak privately with him for a solo mission – an infiltration of _Tenebrae_ of all places – everyone snapped.  They were angry, you respected that.  Officially, the king had just handed everything save for the crown jewel of Lucis over to the enemy, and while the walls protected far more than just the city there still wasn’t nearly enough room for everyone seeking to escape the Empire when that treaty was signed.

You and Nyx didn’t have a lot of time before you needed to report to the castle, your positions within the private halls only the royal family, the Crownsguard patrolling the halls, and king’s council of advisors were allowed to enter.  Well, _officially_ they were the only ones, nobody was going to stop the prince from bringing a friend when he had so little in the first place.

The last time you’d been in those halls had been years ago, and you’d never thought you’d be back.  It was the Crownsguard’s duty to protect these halls.  They worked in tandem with the Citadel Security who managed security cameras, performed background checks on potential employees, created access badges, general security administration that the Crownsguard would be wasted on.  The Kingsglaive…

The beginning and end of your job was the war.  Any positions you held within the walls were temporary, as it was only a matter of time, weeks at most, until you were dispatched to the war once again.  To be assigned to the castle so soon before the treaty, and for you to be saying farewell to Crowe because she was on a covert operation to infiltrate Tenebrae…

You couldn’t help but suspect this wasn’t going to end with peace, and that was assuming the treaty was ever really signed in the first place.

You put on a smile, for the sake of the others, deciding to keep your suspicions to yourself until you had something other than _paranoia_ to back you up.  With his continuing use of Olesaurare, Libertus was becoming more… _emotional_ in his reasoning and reactions to everything, almost picking a fight after the briefing about the treaty.  Crowe had enough on her plate with the mission, and considering what she was doing you were willing to bet she already suspected something was wrong.  Nyx would absolutely believe you, and that was the problem.  He had a hero complex and would want to rush in and fix everything, storm through the halls and try and talk to the king without any evidence beyond a _gut feeling._

No, you had to keep this to yourself for now.

Crowe had her motorcycle and bag packed into the back of a yellow _Speedy Chocobo Cleaning Services_ van, the back doors opened as she said her goodbyes and looked a bit out of place in her civvies while you, Nyx, and Libertus were in uniform.

“A hairpin?” Nyx teased with a chuckle when he spotted the object in the little box Crowe had been messing with in the back of the van, Libertus snickering a little as you rolled your eyes, “I didn’t think you were into that kind of thing.”

“I’m not, it’s a gift for the princess.”  Crowe didn’t snap like she normally would have, catching your attention, as the box in her hand snapped shut.  She tucked it snugly into the pouch strapped to her thigh, “But keep that quiet.  Nobody’s supposed to know.”

The driver honked the nasally horn twice before starting the van, giving Crowe a warning that they had to be leaving within the minute.

“Well,” Crowe checked the watch at her wrist for a second, odd considering she never wore watches and checked the time on her phone, then looked back at the rest of you, “That’s me.”

“Watch your back out there,” Nyx warned, the mood settling in as the three of you said farewell to the fourth member of your patchwork family, Libertus hobbling forward on his crutches.

You and Crowe met eyes briefly.  You both knew where he was headed.

“I know you’re sick of hearing it, but you’re like a little – “

“A little sister to you,” Crowe finished dryly, barely hiding the exasperated sigh threatening to break loose.

“We’re very sick of hearing it,” you deadpanned in addition, eyeing Libertus before shifting your gaze back to Crowe with a little smirk, “I’ll keep the other mages up in line while you’re gone, but I make no promises for these impulsive morons.”

“Oh please, you’re barely any better than they are,” Crowe chuckled before climbing into the back of the van, grabbing the two doors, and before she shut them she left with, “Try not to get in too much trouble while I’m gone.”

As if that wasn’t the cherry on top of an already bad day, things got…weird and uncomfortable.

The Crownsguard, the Marshall in particular, weren’t entirely pleased that the Kingsglaive was taking over their main job.  The fact that they were being sent out of the city with…arguably vague instructions didn’t help matters.

It was a massive change in aura, from what you remembered of the times you’d been in the castle years ago.  The Crownsguard were all issued garments, but they were all personalized.  Save for the fact they were all at least _mostly_ black, the guard could be wearing anything from jeans and a t-shirt to a suit and button-up.  They all had their own weapons and, while they were certainly professionals, they weren’t trained to have the same stark mask that Drautos demanded every Glaive have.

You arguably stuck out compared to the rest of the Glaives guarding the castle, there weren’t a lot of mages compared to the number of warriors, and the only other mage on the Castle Guard was in a different section.  Crownsguard were still scattered around, many members of the Glaives didn’t know the more private halls of the Citadel as well as the Crownsguard and would also need to be filled in on the whole ‘stop and bow’ thing, though the Crownsguard would be departing for their new assignments outside the walls soon.

You still remembered your way around the halls, you’d snuck through them with Noctis enough times.  While the prince was back at the Citadel for the day, you’d managed to avoid any encounters beyond spotting each other during your patrol of the halls.  Maybe it was for the best, he was only there to drop off his car for the Glaives to borrow, strictly for driving around visiting Niflheim dignitaries, and pick up a few things from the room he barely used since he moved out.  What would the two of you even talk about?

On the surface you hadn’t changed much.  You still favored the same style of eyeliner, a simple classic black wing you’d started wearing senior year in high school, tied your brown hair in that same low braid you wore for gym class or soccer matches in school, the heels on your otherwise uniform boots showed you still preferred heels to give your short stature a little boost in height, and to a point your light-footed steps were still the same.

_To a point._

Noctis wasn’t _entirely_ oblivious, though he wished he could be at times, and he’d quickly noticed the way you stood ready to leap into battle at any second, the stern and stony look in your dark brown eyes.  _Neither_ of you were the same people you were, that tends to happen when you don’t speak for years and graduating high school hardly cements one’s personality, but it was easier to just _see_ it with you.  Noctis had changed himself over the years, no longer having the excuse of _homework_ to get out of reading reports or sitting in on crucial meetings, and as much as he’d like to avoid them, he didn’t procrastinate doing these things anymore.  That didn’t make him any less apprehensive about the day he’d have to take the throne, but that didn’t change the fact he already had things he needed to do.

All this musing as he went through his things, finding the things he wanted to take on the trip to Altissia, and directing his thoughts didn’t change the fact that it had been two years.

Two years since the two of you had seen each other, let alone talked, but one glimpse of you and he feels his heart stop and clench as his breath slams to a stop.  He reverted not to the eighteen-year-old he’d been when you last saw each other, but that ten-year-old he’d been when you _first_ saw each other at school, he was trying to dodge the kids asking about how many servants worked in the Citadel and you were a newly arrived Galahdan refugee who couldn’t care _less_ that he was the prince.  Maybe it was selfish on his part, you’d just lost your home and people you loved and being friends with him would be an absolute nightmare, but he’d never – _never –_ had a friend that looked past the whole _prince_ thing before.  Hell, he’d never _met_ anyone that looked past that before.

In his defense he was _ten_.  He was a kid and it had already been two years since he’d withdrawn into himself, the liveliness he’d carried gone since he and his mother were attacked by a massive fiend, the memory of tripping over onto the ground with his mother only to pick up his head and discover he was lying in a pool of her blood as she lay half on top of him – _dead._   It was traumatizing, to say the least, but he was dealing with it.  He had it handled.

Still, just a year later the two of you were leaving the school library after working on a project when Noctis realized he’d left something behind – he honestly couldn’t remember what anymore and that wasn’t really what mattered.  What mattered was that you immediately turned around and hurled your bag over the fence before taking a quick running jump to climb over, stopping at the top to look back at the stunned prince and question, “You want it back or not?”

He suddenly felt more alive than he had since that attack, after he’d gotten over his initial shock, hurling his own bag over the fence and climbing over with you with a grin and barely suppressed giggles as the two of you snuck around to avoid getting in trouble.

It wasn’t always scaling fences to get into the school after it had closed.  Sometimes the two of you were just sitting around his apartment playing games or watching movies, going to the arcade, working on homework or studying for a test, and it was hardly odd for him to be snoozing on the couch as you read.  Of course, after a certain…shift in your relationship there were a handful of _other_ things the two of you might be doing.

Then, after a gathering with the guys to celebrate that the two of you and Prompto graduating high school, things didn’t go the way he’d expected.

To be fair, he hadn’t known exactly _what_ he expected, but it wasn’t an explosive argument.  It had been the first time the two of you had a real argument before, you preferred to take a breath and cool down before taking things out and Noctis wasn’t about to take issue with that.  He’d rather avoid an interpersonal issue than deal with it, bottle up his feelings about the matter and just…never talk about it.  You never let him off the hook like that, making him sit down and talk things out, but you also patiently waited for him to figure out how to voice things as he struggled putting words to how he was feeling.  He was the prince, as apprehensive as he was about his future job, he knew the kinds of sacrifices that would require.  He just got used to bottling things up and burying them _deep_.  Then you came along with a shovel and put _that_ to an end.

Well…sort of…Noctis still found it hard trying to put words to his feelings and his go-to was still bottling things up, and the effect a sheltered childhood had on his interpersonal skills didn’t _exactly_ help.

Noctis was still certain the reason you were ending things, both _whatever_ it was between the two of you _and_ the friendship that started it all, had nothing to do with the fact you’d immigrated to Insomnia as a refugee.  He didn’t care about those things, you certainly didn’t act like you did, and even if you’d never voiced your intentions to join the Kingsglaive it still wouldn’t change anything.  So you’d have to go into the field every once in a while, it’s not like the guys would _forget_ about you.

“I need to remain in the Citadel a while longer, Captain Drautos has arranged for a Glaive to escort you home,” Ignis filled the prince in on the change of plan, nothing massive or worth questioning, the two agreeing to meet up with the others back at Noctis’ apartment before Ignis left to see about his own duties.  It wasn’t long until there was a knock at the door, Noctis pocketing his wooden Carbuncle figurine before grabbing the bag he’d packed and storing his safely in the Armiger.  He probably should have done that years ago, but leaning it against a wall in his room seemed good enough for the last few years.

He froze for a brief second, barely managing to keep going with the flow of things as he shut his bedroom door behind him.

“Your highness,” you greeted, tone professional to match your pose with your hands clasped behind your back, bowing briefly and only as far as your combat training would allow to keep ready for any attack, “I’ve been ordered to escort you back to your apartment.”

You braced yourself when you heard Noctis scoff, shaking his head in his own growing frustration before snapping his blue eyes to your brown and retorted, “Aren’t we a little past the formalities?”

You clenched your hands behind your back.

Two years apart, and a two second glance was all it took to bring everything back.


	4. Never Turn Your Back On The Enemy

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, I imagine Rea to be kind of a glass canon. To put it in gaming terms, she can throw some seriously strong attacks, like her MP stats are crazy high and she’s got a spell for every occasion, but her defense and HP aren’t that high and she can’t wear heavy armor, so it only takes a few hits to take her out.
> 
> Also, I felt like mentioning this little tidbit, but the Beyond is an actual thing in FFXV universe. That’s legit where Bahamut lives, and that’s where Noct ends up when he gets absorbed into the crystal, and it’s sort of assumed that’s kinda the ‘afterlife’ sort of world in FFXV universe. I did not make up a whole new dimension, this is legit canon. I figured most would at least remember that, considering it's a pretty big part of the game since that's where Noctis disappeared to for ten years, but I still wanted to mention it.
> 
> EDIT: Nothing major, literally forgot to fill in the Chapter Title field, but I like to make a note of any/all edits (insert qwerty shrugging emoji here cause idk how to do it and not about to go look for it just to ctl+c/ctl+v it here)

# For Hearth And Home

### Never Turn Your Back On The Enemy

 

_Regis couldn’t say he was entirely surprised to see you there, in your mages’ uniform and standing tall with the assistance of curatives, receiving commendations for your actions during your last assignment.  He clearly recalled the days you were close to his son, who was noticeably absent despite his immense interest in your well-being after hearing you were injured, even when you’d unwittingly succeeded in pulling Noctis out of his shell you seemed entirely focused on the well-being of your friends.  You’d even checked in on Ignis, from time to time, and forced him to sit and rest if only for a moment._

_A few weeks ago, you’d been sent with a handful of warriors to infiltrate an Imperial base setting up just on Lucian boarders, but things had gone wrong.  The imps hadn’t just bolstered their numbers with Magitech soldiers and mechs, but fiends and daemons as well._

_You had held a barrier as the warriors escaped, explosives primed, but were forced to use a fireball to trigger the explosion early and prevent the daemons from pursuing the rest of your team.  It had nearly cost you your life, your Protega protecting you from the worst of the explosion itself but the ground-shattering explosion throwing you and your shield back to crash into the thick cement walls as they crumbled.  According to the report, it had taken a concerning amount of Phoenix Downs – plural – and Elixirs matched with hurried CPR to get your pulse back._

_You still had a few bruises and you would be out of the field as long as your arm was in that sling, but even if you had decided to turn in your uniform your actions and near sacrifice deserved some recognition.  If you hadn’t sacrificed yourself an entire squad had been lost, and the Kingsglaive never had the kind of numbers even the Crownsguard could boast._

_The king continued commending you as you stood before the throne, but he noticed you weren’t really paying attention.  Your attention was captured to the wall in front of you, standing on that dais you were closer to the crystal than you’d ever been, and if you had just been staring off into space he would have forgotten it.  You were recovering, he’d recalled days in his youth when he was functioning on caffeine and Hi-Potions after a nasty dust-up with daemons or fiends, but this was different._

_Your brow furrowed, head tilted a little, like you were trying to listen.  Like you were hearing something that caught you off guard and were trying to make sense of it, even closing your eyes for a moment before remembering yourself and snapping them back open before anyone thought you were falling asleep._

_The crystal was the only gateway to the ethereal Beyond, something that served as both an afterlife and birthplace of souls, the source of whatever magic was on Eos even before the Astrals arrived.  It now, almost primarily, served as Bahamut’s realm, the dimension the dragon had claimed as his own and hadn’t left since he first entered countless decades ago._

_If you were hearing something…_

_It was in the Beyond._

_Something was trying to reach through to you…_

_And the king doubted it was the Astral._

********

It had been days since Crowe left.

You were deciding to focus on that part of the day rather than the awkward drive to Noctis’ apartment.  It was nice to see the guys again, nostalgic, but you considered it a luxury that you had to get back to the Citadel.

It wasn’t unusual for a Glaive to go silent on an infiltration operation, but it still unnerved you.  Mages weren’t generally sent on infiltrations, and when they were it was either you or Liliana as you’d both had a mastery of the Invisibility spell most others didn’t.  It wasn’t that Crowe was incapable, she was quite the opposite, but Drautos’ decision struck you as _odd_.  And then Crowe had told the three of you about that present for the princess that _nobody_ was supposed to know about, and wearing a watch when she didn’t even _own_ one…

It was all just a bunch of pieces that didn’t fit together, like if you could find the central puzzle piece they’d all fit and it would make sense, but you didn’t have time for that.

You’d just walked in the door when Drautos cut you off from reaching your post, “[L/N], get over here.  Now.”

You didn’t argue, following the captain into an empty room and preparing to either be chewed out or filled in on whatever clusterfuck had _already_ happened.

“Change of plans, you’re to shadow the king until further notice.”

“The king?”  That was, by far, the strangest order you could have ever been given.  “Does his Shield know about this?”

“He does, and he approves.  Apparently, he doesn’t trust our Imperial guests.”  Drautos’ small jest was deadened by the tone he naturally carried, even when he wasn’t raising his voice it sounded like he was barking orders.  “Crowe was supposed to find the princess and escort her out of Tenebrae, but seeing as the princess is here and Crowe hasn’t checked in, we’re left assuming the worst.”

“What’s being done to secure her?” you questioned, a few pieces starting to fall together as the gravity of the situation fell into place.  Somebody must have _known_ Crowe was going after Lady Lunafreya.  Now, the question was did someone intercept the message telling the princess someone was coming for her, or was there a traitor on the inside?

“Ulric and I are picking her up for a private counsel with the king, but we can’t assign a constant guard or the Imperials will know we suspect something.  Just focus on the king and make sure nobody sees you.”

That made sense.  It was unfortunate, it was far from ideal, but it made sense.

“Yes sir.”  With a practiced wave of your hand you cast an Invisibility spell over yourself, waiting until Drautos left the room to slip through the door before slipping through the halls and to the throne room.  You suspected King Regis knew you were there, he’d know how to spot an Invisibility spell in close quarters and you’d had to silently traverse the stairs before relying on skills you’d learned as an orphan in Galahd long before you became an orphaned refugee in Insomnia, climbing up the metal décor behind the throne itself, the golden sheen having faded and giving it an antiquely look among the sheen it still carried, before finding a spot you could perch on and quietly watch the entire room.  You might have to use one of the two knives at the back of your belt to point-warp, something that was far easier with a larger target like a dagger or sword, but you’d make do.

You watched overhead as the princess entered the throne room, Nyx standing guard only a few steps behind her, and the Oracle and king had as close to a heartfelt reunion as they could after three years.

“I am too old to fight this war, I have no choice but to receive the Empire and accept their treaty.  Even so…I had hoped to hold the wedding elsewhere – somewhere safe.  I sent one of my Glaive to see you there, but – “ the king stopped, as did the rest of you, to watch Lady Lunafreya as she shook her head slightly.  It seems that, not only had she not known Crowe was on her way, but she’d not even come into contact with the mage.  “It is not too late.  I can ready an escort.  Please, go to my son.”

“No,” Lunafreya denied the offer, the plea, as gently as she could while still remaining firm, “Wherever I go, the empire will follow.  It would only place the prince in greater danger.  It is my duty to protect the prince, and see his destiny fulfilled.  These twelve years have not changed that.”

Destiny?

Noctis had never mentioned anything like that, but even if he did know it would be just like him to just burry it deep and never talk about it.  Getting him to talk about anything took a particular touch, one you’d inadvertently gained growing up as one of a handful of orphans that took care of each other, or maybe you always had that trait.  Classic _Nature vs. Nurture_ debate.

You couldn’t be worried about that.  Not now.

“And what of your destiny?” Regis’s voice was filled with concern, sorrow even, like there was an inevitable doom he was trying to prevent by throwing himself to the wolves.

“My duty is my destiny, Your Majesty,” Lady Lunafreya stood strong, in spite of whatever doom she was facing, “I’m prepared to accept whatever may come to pass.”

_Lambs…slaughter…shameful_

That voice again…louder this time, but still warbled like she was yelling angrily into water.  It _sounded_ like a feminine voice, but you could only – just barely – make out a few words here and there.

You’d been hearing it for a while, since your nearly fatal experience a few weeks before the disastrous operation that forced King Regis to accept this clearly feigned offer of peace.  You’d heard that some people, when their heart stops and they are resuscitated, are left with a faint residue of the Beyond on their souls and they were able to hear the souls of the dead – but only for a short period of time.  You’d figured, if you were going to give credence to a fairytale, it would have passed by now…and it wouldn’t be just the _one voice._

You remained in the shadows, following the king out of the throne room and through the halls to the chambers he spoke with his council of advisors, and were only allowed to leave his side once.  A castle hand quietly passed a message to Clarus, who then passed it along to the king, whose eyes immediately snapped to where you remained cloaked under your invisibility spell.

“I apologize, but there is a private matter I must attend to immediately,” King Regis announced suddenly, standing and making his way down the halls to his private office, Clarus and yourself following.  You waited until the door was shut and locked before releasing the Invisibility spell.

“Did you wish to speak, Your Majesty?”  You’d be a fool not to notice that the king looked at you when he received the news that caused him to rush down the halls.

“The Glaive who was sent to retrieve the princess…I’m afraid I have bad news.”  Sometimes the king cared too much for his well-being.

“How long since she was killed?”  You suspected this was coming since Drautos told you why Crowe was infiltrating Tenebrae.  She might not specifically be one of the Glaives _particularly_ gifted in stealth, but she was still trained and knew what she was doing.  More than that, personal feelings about the treaty aside, she was loyal.

“You expected this?”

“Since the captain told me why she was going to Tenebrae.  Crowe wasn’t just my friend, she was loyal, her death is the only way she’d ever fail a mission.”

“You may go to see her, if you wish,” the king relieved you of your post, temporarily, and while you hated the heartbroken look on his face, you knew you were right to deny it.

“With all do respect, what I want isn’t what’s best, or even what Crowe would want,” you explained, looking to both the king and his Shield, “I don’t know why you both decided I need to be here, and frankly I don’t care, because the enemy isn’t just at our doorstep.  They’re in the house, and I don’t trust them.”

With Niflheim’s reputation, you would never be able to turn your back on them.

Not while they were still the enemy.

_Not after they killed Crowe._


	5. It's Still Amazing That Anyone Thought This Would End Well

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> My cat kept trying to demand pets while I was typing, and when he eventually settled down, I kept having to bat his paw off the keyboard. So, bets are there are typos I’m gonna have to fix later.
> 
> Also, having insomnia makes for some insane progress. So…there’s that…

# For Hearth And Home

### It's Still Amazing That Anyone Thought This Would End Well

 

Lady Lunafreya had been taken by the Empire, likely sometime after the celebration of the treaty.  You all got lucky, while the princess wished to speak with Nyx while he stood on guard duty during the celebration, the Glaive managed to give her the hairclip Crowe had meant to give to her.  Using the receiver, the watch Crowe had been wearing, Nyx had given Pelna the coordinates and the later found a fleet of Niflheim airships prepared for war.

During all this, Captain Drautos was nowhere to be found, but the king himself had given the order to deploy.  Nyx had tried to reach you, everyone had to be honest, and your only option was to slip your phone out of your pocket and hold it carefully to keep it covered under your Invisibility spell.  Invisibility didn’t block any sound you made, you still had to keep quiet, but you could send a text without making any noise.  You couldn’t exactly _say_ why you couldn’t get there, but you snapped a shot of the throne room as Nyx left and sent it to him.

Your phone buzzed a second later.

_Got it._

“If I may, there are people who claim they hear the spirits in the Beyond after nearly dying,” the king kept his voice down as he asked you the question, staring out the window once again as he seemed deep in thought.  Calculating something more than the growing tensions within the Citadel.  It was hardly unusual for King Regis to keep things to himself, part of his job was making sure he knew more than anyone else in the room, but you couldn’t say you knew where he was going with this.  “Do you still hear them?”

You carefully climbed down from your vantage point to remain close to the king, keeping your own voice down as you answered.

“I think I do, at times…it’s just the one woman, I think, but it’s not clear.”

He nodded a bit in thought, turning and leading both you and Clarus out of the throne room and to the treaty signing without another word on the subject.  As Clarus and the rest of the council were forced to take their seats, the king set to sit by Emperor Aldercapt at a table feet away from the nearest chair, you kept light on your feet and remained by the king, Protega at your fingertips and ready to fly at a moment’s notice.

Any moment now…

Any moment…

Emperor Aldercapt reached under his coat as he and the king reached the table and the treaty was laid on it.

Any moment…

An explosion rocked the Citadel, you threw off your Invisibility in exchange for a Protega around yourself and the king as he held crackling lightning in his hand, prepared to fire, and the council on one side of the room took up arms against the Niflheim diplomats on the other.  A second explosion rocked the Citadel, and you caught sight of the Wall falling just outside, like glass shards raining from the sky.  You sacrificed part of your Protega guarding your back to push forward and throw the Emperor back, the king whirling around to face you and catching you completely off guard as he snatched your wrist.  You were paralyzed – you recognized the Hold spell he’d cast on you, only strong enough to keep you still for a few moments but enough to keep you still – as he knocked off your hood to press his second palm against your forehead, like he had when he gave you your magic in the first place.

“I am sorry, [Y/N].”  He was so sincere, you honestly believed him despite how mad you _wanted_ to be, but you _felt_ the sparks of magic leaving your body and completely draining you.  “You will be stronger for this, I swear it.”

It didn’t _feel_ like it.  You felt the Hold collapse, but so did _you_.  You could barely register the battle going on around you, shaking as you gasped for breath, barely getting back up onto your hands and knees as the empire took advantage of the fallen Wall, their airships flying in and Magitech soldiers crashing through the window and opening fire.  Holding a Protega to shield those closest to him, yourself included, was hardly a struggle for the king, but there were still many who fell in the ambush.

Just what in the hell was King Regis thinking?  You could have _easily_ dealt with those soldiers before they even landed, but instead you were stuck _watching, struggling to stand_ as the king, Clarus, and the only surviving members of the king’s council defeated the soldiers.  You were just barely standing, leaning against the table holding that _joke_ of an unsigned treaty as General Glauca practically glided through the hole in the window overhead, gliding through the air just far enough to block the only safe exit.

“You gotta be _fucking_ kidding me,” you cursed under your breath.  Of course, the Captain was nowhere to be found, so Glauca was able to magically fucking _teleport_ to wherever was most _inconvenient_ to Lucis.

You hadn’t expected this to be a _good_ day, you’d expected something pretty bad to be honest, but at least you could fucking _stand up_.

King Regis himself had said he’s too old to fight a war, Clarus was no spring chicken himself, and if you could just stop fucking _shaking_ you’d snap at that young councilman that he was holding his sword all wrong.  Taking on General Glauca would have been a struggle even with your magic, that was easy to tell as he cut through the entire council like melted fucking butter just as you were starting to recover.

_Unnatural…enhanced…_

There was that fucking voice again, but it was a bit clearer.  Not like it was being drowned out by water, but echoing over itself over and over, it was hard to make out all the words when it sounded like she was saying all the words at once.  Whoever she was, she’d given you good advice before, and desperate times call for desperate measures.

_Keep down…not you…he wants…_

Safe enough…but that doesn’t help you help the king.  Magic or not, you still had the damn uniform, and even if Niflheim had taken the crystal King Regis was still the Lucian king.  You had a job.

Helped that you wanted some goddamn _answers._

With every wave of echoes of the woman in your head, you felt a calming wave hush the jitters in your bones, feeling your strength come back as you were forced to watch the king fight Glauca on his own, the Imperial soldier cutting the Ring of Lucii from the king’s hand.  You managed to get up and rush over to the king’s side as he fell to his knee, holding his bleeding hand as he cauterized the wound with fire.  You heard the ring rolling across the stone floor before stopping as Ravus picked it up.

“The Ring of the Lucii,” Ravus celebrated like a man who had just exacted his revenge, holding the ring in his hand as it stole all his attention, all until his anger was reignited and turned towards the king, “I lost my mother, my country, my birthright.  Niflheim was the only life left to me, but all of that was for this.  The ring belongs to me now.”

Glauca rushed forward, an attempt to stop Ravus from putting on the ring, but the second he did the world _stopped._   Glauca was frozen in air, King Regis remained still as he watched like he was expecting an inevitable doom, Nyx and Lady Lunafreya were frozen in the hallway just outside as they sprinted to you, and you snapped your head to look at each and every one in shock until you heard _them._

“Hear me, Lucian kings of old, for I am Ravus Nox Fleuret,” Ravus called out to the kings, an aura taking over the room and blocking out the world around, the only light coming from the ring itself as the small section of the Beyond locked inside the ring to hold the Lucii fell upon the natural world and pulled not only the wearer – Ravus – into it, but you as well.  “and none is more worthy of your power than I.”

They hung above the prince denied his country, all 112 of them, impersonal suits of armor with unreadable masks for faces and voices echoing through the ethereal realm that had taken over for only a moment, but blanketing the world around in a dark and deep blue, endless…

You’d seen this before…something like it at least…it brought back images of something similar…

_“You will never be granted our power.”_

“No, why?” Ravus started to panic, his world view shattering around him, “Why do you refuse me?”

 _“Impetuous boy,”_ a large one just about sneered as Ravus’ hand was set aflame, blue at the center of the fire spreading up his arm, _“You claim a right to power beyond your understanding.”_

The ethereal blue of the flame snapped to the crisp orange as the Lucii snapped back into the ring and time resumed, the light of day once again flooding into the room as Glauca cut the ring from Ravus’ hand as the prince fell to the ground and writhed in pain.  The ring rolled across the floor, stopping at King Regis’ feet before he picked it up.  As Lunafreya ran to you and the king, Glauca turning towards you as well, Nyx warped forward to grab the general’s attention and you…you didn’t think.  Glaive training was designed to burry the skills and practices of a Glaive deep, so deep you didn’t even think before casting a spell, because that one fraction of a second you might take to remember you could use magic could spell life or death for you, your comrades, and any charges you were protecting.

You just acted on instinct, rising to your feet as Lunafreya grabbed the king’s cane and reached the two of you, raising your hand, went through the practiced technique of raising a Protega –

_And succeeded._

There were certain differences, for example the pieces of the honeycomb pattern that made up the shield were smaller and glistened like shards of glass in the sunlight, but it was basically the same thing.

Oh, yeah, and there was the whole _‘casting magic even after the king took it away from you’_ thing.

You shoved your shock down _deep_ , now really wasn’t the time, holding the barrier up between the three of you and the battle between Nyx and Glauca as the king opened a hidden passage.  You backed into the room, keeping the barrier up, as you called out to your friend warping around the armored enemy, “Nyx!  Come on!”

With a practiced maneuver, you lowered the barrier at the last second and ducked aside as Nyx’s kukri flew into the corridor, the fire you’d been holding in your other hand flying through the air to keep Glauca from following as Nyx he warped after his blade in a burst of blue, red embers fluttering around him briefly after he’d snapped into the room and the door shut behind him.

A moment of silence fell over the four of you, Nyx catching his breath as Lunafreya ripped off a part of her dress to wrap the king’s hand and you leaned back against the wall in utter shock.

Well…

Things couldn’t get more fucked than they already were.

At least there was that…


	6. The Voices In The Beyond

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There were some ideas scrapped in the process of writing this. A lot of ideas. Like, they sounded cool, but when I wrote them out it overly complicated things to the point that even I found it confusing. So some stuff got scrapped.
> 
> It really wasn't important to the story itself, just little ideas I thought were cool until I tried to write it out and realized they got in the way of things.
> 
> Also, I realize the ending is a bit snippy, short, and left with more questions than answers. That's kind of the goal. I love the Rea in Strings of Fate, I'm hoping those of you who read Strings of Fate did/do too, but there really wasn't much detail in her career as a Glaive. What I mean is, we don't see her with the others much, we don't see how she reacted to the attack on Insomnia yet, we didn't see her get through the war itself. We saw the aftermath, which I think is just important and I'm still really hoping I managed to stress the fact that she was still recovering from that at the time SoF takes place, but I wanted to go more into detail with this Rea.
> 
> Unlike SoF Rea, this one was an orphan from the get-go. She was an orphan when she was in Galahd, she had people depending on her, she didn't have the option of joining the Glaive because she needed to get whipped into shape and put in line. SoF Rea felt she wasn't fit for anything else.
> 
> This Rea joined because she was on the front-lines from the start, this war was basically her life, she knew and saw so many people it hurt, and she just wants it all to stop. She just wants the war to stop. Her story isn't so much in the recovery, she'll take joy in having no place as a soldier anymore. She's an artist who went to war because it was the right thing to do. I don't want to say exactly what her character arc is, because I don't wanna give TOO much away, but I wanted to just...share that I guess.

# For Hearth And Home

### The Voices In The Beyond

 

Things got worse.

Of course, they got worse.

Things always got worse.

The king sacrificed himself for the three of you, casting a Protega to keep the rest of you separated from him and General Glauca, buying you time to get away with the princess and the ring as the Niflheim soldier killed him.

And it all came down to that damn _destiny_ they’d talked about in the throne room the day the princess arrived.

In the mess, someone had managed to identify locals who had helped Niflheim steal the crystal.  The news had taken over every channel in the disaster, a channel tuned into the touch screen in the car’s radio console.  Whole buildings had collapsed, Magitech soldiers were in the streets, Niflheim had flooded the city with their mechs, and without the magic of the Wall there was nothing keeping daemons from forming when the sun finished falling in a matter of minutes.  To top things off, Libertus had been identified as one of the people responsible for helping Niflheim.

Follow that up with getting shot at by an airship, with a few of the Glaive traitors on board, Nyx’s failed attempt at warping since his power left when the king died, a successful escape owed to a blast of lightning you shot at the airship before two more dropped mechs in the road so Nyx drove the car through the guide rail of the overpass and onto a rooftop.  Nyx and Lunafreya, despite Nyx’s short detour falling off the ledge of the building and into a thin alleyway where he’d managed to reverse the car into falling sideways so it would get caught on a large air conditioning unit and give him enough time to tumble into a nearby window, managed to meet up and duck into a nearby office space.  You held off the mechs with a Protega before ducking aside and getting in a few well-placed Thundagas before making a break for it.

After ditching the hairpin, the homing beacon the enemy was using to track Lunafreya, the three of you were carefully making your way through the already war torn streets to meet up with the Captain.

You were about 99.99% sure you’d seen apocalypse movies less disastrous than the last… _hour_ of your life, and all of this was for a ring with powers that – until Ravus put on that ring – you thought were just a _legend._

“How the hell can you still use magic?” Nyx couldn’t help but ask as the three of you caught your breath for a brief moment, deciding to try and focus on _something_ he could make some sense of and not the _Old Wall of legend is real_ thing.

“Best guess?  The same way I saw the Lucii when Ravus put on that ring,” you answered, checking the street before taking the lead and turning the corner as the other two quickly followed, “However it works, King Regis seemed to know about it before I did.  The second the Niffs attacked, he took away the magic he gave me, said I’d be _stronger for it.”_

“Could you be related?” Lunafreya threw out the only theory that could work, the only one any of you _knew of_ anyway, and you couldn’t help but snort at the thought.

“Random orphan from Galahd happens to be royalty?  A bit of a cliché,” you retorted as you dug an Ether out of your pack and applied it before using a more reasonable logic to deny the possibility, “Besides, I don’t think it’s related.  Everyone sort of… _froze_ , except me and Ravus.  Even the king.”

Now probably wasn’t the time to mention the whole _voice in your head_ thing, especially since Nyx already looked like he was screaming in his head.

To be fair, you were too.

“Look, before you go around playing hero, I’m our ace in the hole and that courtyard is a killing ground,” you stared Nyx down, the warrior gritting his teeth, “You stay here with the princess, I’ll go out first in case it’s an ambush.”

Nyx inhaled, planning on arguing, but Lunafreya cut him off.  You hadn’t the faintest what they’d talked about in that office building before you caught up, but you were just grateful it was enough for her to get through to him, “Being cautious doesn’t mean you’re powerless.”

Nyx drew in his bottom lip, biting down on it before finally relinquishing whatever argument he wanted to give and ordered, “You be careful out there.”

“Says the guy that just drove a car off an overpass,” you snorted with a smirk before making your way out to the courtyard, down the steps, and towards the monument in the center, “[L/N] reporting in.  The princess is with me.”

The second you announced that, you caught sight of Luche, gun in his hand, and threw up a Protega as he took a few shots at you.

“Well, well, look who still has their magic.”  You clenched your jaw and narrowed your eyes at Luche as you stared him down, your dark brown eyes only growing darker as he brought up something you’d hoped to _leave_ in your past.  “The prince show you that trick when you were sneaking around with him?  It’s not a secret you hung around with him, and it’s not like teenagers sneak around for anything _else_.”

Right or not didn’t give him the right to call you a _whore_.

Just what in the _hell_ did he know?

Your fist shook at your side you were clenching it so hard, the traitor taking a few more shots at you as the heat of the fire traveled down your arm and gathered around your fist, growing with every shot.

“Even Crowe couldn’t hold that spell forever, we got to her eventually” he mocked as you grit your teeth, the fireball beginning to grow on its own as your fist clenched tighter, but you waited.  “Others are on the way, and we’ll do _whatever_ it takes.  We’ll get the ring, and we’ll get our homes – “

“Crowe was too good to watch you _burn.”_

You threw your barrier down with one hand and threw the fireball with your other, Luche screaming as it spread throughout his body and he started flailing in an attempt to put it out.  It wasn’t long before he crumpled in a flaming heap.  You took a few steps back before turning and making a run for the others.

“We gotta get out of here,” Nyx decided when you got back, “We have to get out of the city, we can’t take any more chances with trusting the others.”

He was right.  The captain had been the one that sent the three of you there, meaning he was likely one of the traitors too.

At this point, it was looking like more Glaives had turned traitor than those who hadn’t.

“Let’s head back to the Citadel first, I think there’s something back there we can use and it’s on the way to the gate,” you proposed, “Worst case scenario, we find another car.”

“It’s not that far from here, might as well give it a shot,” Nyx agreed, the two of you checking the area before all three of you stuck to cover as you left Section D.  Once they found Luche, whoever else was working with him would know exactly who killed him.  It’s not like the _entire invading force_ was after literally _anybody else_ in the city.  You stopped to watch as Drautos parked the car he was driving, Noctis’ car you’d noticed, and stepped out to examine the scene, and then he spotted the three of you on the other side of the courtyard.

You all stopped when you saw another car park on the opposite end of the courtyard, spotting Libertus in the driver’s seat just before he sped forward and slammed the car into Drautos, pinning the captain against a stone wall lining part of the courtyard.  The three of you stopped and watched it all unfold, the car thrown over the wall, leaving General Glauca where Drautos –

Well, that certainly explained why Drautos was suddenly _unavailable_ whenever Glauca was around, and how Niflheim knew about a mission only Drautos, Crowe, and the king knew about.

Overhead, an imperial airship was carrying the same daemon that nearly wiped out everyone dispatched to that disastrous operation at the boarder only _days_ ago, and Drautos kept getting closer.

“It’s over.  The daemons are unleashed.  Lucis is fallen.”  He stopped, giving the three of you a single order.  “Surrender the ring.”

Running wasn’t exactly an option.  You would probably be able to outrun him by warping, but you’d end up leaving the other two behind.  You could hold him off long enough for them to get away, but you doubted either Nyx or Lunafreya would be willing to do that.  You braced yourself to throw up a Protega, but the world around you _stopped_ before you could do that, chunks of city lights just shutting off before you were cast in a darkness you had no hope of seeing through until a deep and endless blue hovering around as you turned to see Nyx had grabbed the ring from the princess and put it on before anyone could stop him.

“This about what it looked like last time?” Nyx asked, trying to make light of the situation despite the Lucii surrounding the two of you.

“Well, they were hovering in the air last time, and I’m willing to be that new one is King Regis,” you nodded your head towards one you didn’t recognize as you looked around, “But, yeah.  Basically.”

 _“You call upon the wards of this world’s future, mortal.  And if you come lusting for our power, you must first stand in our judgement.”_   That voice, whoever it belonged to, didn’t even sound human anymore.

“How long will you do nothing whilst Insomnia burns?” Nyx questioned the kings, questioned their reluctance to protect their own kingdom, “Old, or new, or whatever it is, summon your Wall.”

_“You do not command us.  Yours is not even royal blood.  It does not fall to us to guard your city.  Man is a fool creature, clinging to his past and cowering from his future.  Wasting his strength on bygone days.”_

“And what future are you wards of?”  Nyx was getting sick of hearing that.  Hearing people say they were _protecting the future_ to let people die.  People weren’t pawns to be sacrificed to protect some unspoken future, there was no future without people to begin with.

_They fear failure, their rules dictated by foreign creatures who claim themselves gods but gave them no power and cursed the eldest of them._

That was…surreal.  That was the first time you’d heard her so clearly – no.  No, you’d heard her before.  You’d been in a place like this before…or a different part of this place.  It was a pocket of the Beyond – of the afterlife – and you’d been recalling the same thing in a dream that gave you restless sleep every night.

 

********

 

_You were sort of…floating in this endless world, a comfortable deep blue surrounding you.  You saw others, at least you thought the were other people, glittering through the endless depths before they seemed to sort of…disappear in a flash.  You could catch glimpses of different places in those bright flashes.  Idyllic shores, lush forests, endless green meadows, crystalline cities, cozy libraries…_

_You vaguely remembered where you’d been before you arrived here, the Imperial base covered in daemons, the barrier you were holding to buy your comrades time, the bomb…then you crashed against the wall?  Or maybe it fell on top of you…it was a small space…suffocating…_

_You’d died…_

_That was a risk in the field, you knew that, and you’d died protecting the people and land you loved.  You wished you could have had more time…there were things you wish you could have aid…but you were okay with this._

_You kept floating along, waiting to find you place, when a bright light caught your attention.  It was nearly blinding, a brilliant white, tall and thin, and you felt…calm.  Welcome.  Safe._

_“No.  No, I’m sorry.  You must go back.”_

_Something…something big…foreboding…black blocked you from the light.  Someone?  Someone in armor…blades –_

_You heard Libertus calling your name frantic and afraid as he screamed for you to wake up, crying and begging._

_The breath was ripped from your lungs as something snatched you and yanked – **hard.**_

****

********

 

You snapped your attention back to Nyx, his hand set aflame after he snapped at the Lucii for his irreverence and challenging them to prove their worth.  You cast a thick layer of ice over your hands, your gloves would keep you warm enough, as you clasped your hand around Nyx’s and put out the fire.  You pulled your hands away to check the damage, keeping an aura of cold around the burns, when you heard a voice you recognized.

_King Regis._

He was cryptic, but he always had been.  He guarded you after he took your magic away, protecting you as you struggled to even stand, and sacrificed himself so you, Lunafreya, and Nyx could escape.  Cryptic or not, you trusted him.

_“You’ve been here before, what did you see?”_

“A light, a bright light…a voice came from it.  She said it wasn’t safe and then…something in black, in armor.  It chased me out.”

_“This voice.  Do you still hear it?”_

“Sometimes…it’s faint most of the time, it’s clearer when this…place takes over, but it’s still her.”

There was a thick silence.  Heavy.  All 113 pairs of kingly eyes turned to you as they calculated… _something._   Like they knew so much more than you did.  Where they about to tell you?  Was one of them about to give you answers?  Or was it going to be more of the same bullshit?

“Who is she?  Why is she talking to me?”

Nothing.  Just a long silence.  A full minute before someone spoke again, one of the older kings who had lost the humanity in their voice generations ago.  You were left with one last word before Lucii took the pocket of the Beyond trapped within the ring and slipped away and released you and Nyx back into the mortal world.

_“Gather your allies and leave this city.  You will have your protection, for the night.”_

They seemed to believe you had some role in this cryptic future they served.

It would be nice if you knew what the hell that was.


	7. Unexpected Twists Tend To Complicate Things

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry this one took a bit. I needed a bit of a refresher on the details of the very beginning of the game, it should be noted I’m replaying it, and since I was going around doing all the side quests it took a bit.
> 
> Basically, I’m replaying the ENTIRE game.
> 
> It is partially for the fic, but it’s also cause despite my frustration at not getting our ‘true ending’ now that the DLC are cancelled it’s still an amazing game that I absolutely love. If I didn’t love it and the characters, I wouldn’t get so frustrated at stuff like this.

# For Hearth And Home

### Unexpected Twists Tend To Complicate Things

 

The kings hadn’t been kidding when they told you to get out.

None of you knew what the wall was, but you’d all seen at least one of the nine massive statues around the city.  Stone knights that nobody remembered being built, no history book recorded their creation, yet were all heavily protected by royal decree.  Nobody really questioned it, it was just the way things were, but it made sense when the stone giants came to life and stood tall against the daemons filing the city, making light work of the mechs on the overpasses with a sweep of a solid arm, even taking a moment to _kick_ Glauca as he attempted to follow your escape with Nyx, Lunafreya, and Libertus.

The whole disaster was a series of curses, Lunafreya had let out a few you’d literally never heard before, interrupted by a quick trip into a few nearby shops to stuff things you would need into bags, before making a mad dash to a car and hotwiring it, and then swerving all over the road to keep from getting squished by either a knight’s foot, a daemon foot, or falling debris.

Nyx had parked the car a safe distance from the Wall, the four of you climbing out and splitting up the loot from the city as you made a plan.  Lunafreya – _Luna_ , she’d insisted you all call her Luna after everything you’d gone through together – had taken some arguing before she’d agreed to someone gong with her – Nyx specifically.  The king had asked him to get the princess to Altissia, Nyx had no intentions of doing anything else.  Libertus wanted to help the refugees escaping Insomnia, even if he had been under the impression the attack was nothing more than picketing outside the Citadel he felt responsible, and with his leg still in a cast he knew there wasn’t much he could do in a fight.  You were sticking around the area for a bit, there were refugees who needed help getting out or someone to keep them safe from fiends or daemons as they found safety, and to top things off the Crownsguard would arrive soon.  The marshal probably wanted to know everything that happened, and it was best if somebody stuck around to tell him.

You were only waiting an hour after you split up from the others.

The four of you had to walk for a bit, a car from the Crown City was about thirty years ahead of anything outside the walls and would stick out like a sore thumb.  It took a bit to find it, and honestly you felt a bit bad about helping Nyx and Luna steal a car from an unsuspecting victim, but desperate times. 

“So,” Nyx kept his voice down as you and he said a private farewell, “You gotta tell anyone about the whole…voice thing?  Seemed like the Lucii thought it was important.”

“The way they reacted, I think it’s better to keep it on a need-to-know.  At least until I find out more,” you reasoned, not wanting to jump to any conclusions before you had any real answers, “I’ll find a way to explain the magic, if I’m lucky the marshal won’t know the Glaives lost their magic and I won’t have to explain it.  As far as we know, anyone else that could use magic is either dead, or was only granted access to the royal Armiger by the prince.  There’s a chance I could pull it off.”

“Good idea, we don’t know if the Niffs know anything about this either, and we still don’t know what this _destiny_ the king and Luna talked about is,” Nyx nodded a little in agreement, thoughtful expression shifting to a small crooked smile, an attempt at a teasing smirk when the two of you knew this might be a final farewell, “You still be careful.”

“Look who’s talking,” you snorted in response, lightly punching him on the arm as he chuckled for just a moment.  The two of you looked at each other once more before pulling in for one last hug, saying goodbye so he could get back into the car and drive himself and the princess further from the wall.  Libertus stuck around for a few days, gathering some refugees from the city before taking off, but by then you were already in the deep end with helping the Crownsguard.

You’d abandoned your uniform for the time being, just as Nyx had, as wearing a target on your backs wouldn’t be _half_ as dangerous as wearing your Glaive uniforms.  The Crownsguard garments were all personalized, most of them simply looking like clothing anyone else could be wearing despite being quite the opposite, it allowed them to mostly go unrecognized by the enemy until it was too late.  You needed that same level of anonymity for the time being.

You weren’t going to completely abandon darker colors, you wouldn’t wear them _every day_ , but you would still stick to blacks and darker blues and violets when you were working with the Crownsguard.  Sense of uniformity and all that.  When you were off on your own, it was best to stick with lighter colors, helped avoid being suspected by the enemy.  Though, you’d needed to see if Cor could get you a new phone.

You and Nyx tossed your phone and Glaive com units as soon as you could.  You didn’t know who you could trust, especially considering the captain had been a _General_ for the imps, and it was better to play things safe.  It took a bit, it’s not like the marshal kept spare phones in his pockets, but there were a few Crownsguard still located in the city that managed to grab some gear before getting as many civilians out of the city as they could.

You had some gill to spend, and you were running low on curatives – _Ethers_ most noticeably, though you could do with some Potions and Hi-Potions too.

You made your stop in Hammerhead, closest stop to the mess you were dealing with a few miles from the bridge to Insomnia’s wall, before heading to the blockade Niflheim had set up blocking passage to the rest of the mainland.  The plan had been to hit that thing, hard, since it first went up, but Cor told you to hold off for a bit.  Something he needed to take care of first, and he wanted to be there when you hit the blockade. 

The old man that ran the garage, Cid, leaned forward in his reclined beach chair by the shop he ran with the girl he’d raised as his own, Cindy.  When you exited the store, tucking your newly purchased items into the pouch at your side, attached to the black belt looped through your cut-off denim shorts and a second belt wrapped around your thigh, you looked up to see the old man still looking your way.  His brow was furrowed, like he recognized you, and all things considered you figured it would best to see if he _did._   He wasn’t an enemy, but he was supposed to be an old friend of the king’s, maybe he knew something about the whole…magic thing.

“You recognize me?” you kept it simple as you reached him, hands lazily tucked into your pockets, the hem of your loose black crop-top just barely brushing the waist of your high-waisted shorts, your gray cotton button down far too big for you with the hem dropping below your shorts and the sleeves rolled up to hang a bit below your elbows.

“You the Glaive Cor told me to keep an eye out for?”  He knew you were, that was clear from his tone, but you weren’t surprised he asked.

“The mage, yeah,” you clarified, shifting the black duffle bag over your shoulder and your stance in your sturdy ankle-high black boots, the thick high-heels comfortable at a similar height to the boots of your now abandoned uniform and the black fuzz inside and along the top of your boots soft, your thin black thigh-high stockings offering nothing in warmth but you liked them and they were comfortable.

“Said you’d need a ride, there’s a Hunter waiting for you.”  Cid nodded to the hunter filling up the gas tank of his old truck, the back packed with supplies for the refugees escaping the city.  You looked over and caught the Hunter’s eye, waving in a silent signal that you were the one he was waiting around for and you’d be there in a bit.

“That everything?” you asked as you turned back to Cid, “Seemed spooked when you saw me, like I’m some kind of ghost.”

“Just remind me of someone, happens a lot when you get my age.”

You didn’t quite believe him, but you didn’t have time to waste and you didn’t want to push him into talking about it when he didn’t seem keen on it.  So, you settled for just thanking him with a simple farewell, tying your hair up into a clip as you made your way to the truck.  You introduced yourself to the Hunter briefly, climbing into the passenger’s side of the truck and watching the scenery go by through the open window as the wind blew through the strands of hair that fell loose from your hair clip and framed your face.  The Hunter stopped just short of your destination, now wasn’t the time to be seen yet, and you grabbed your bag and slipped out before he kept driving on to the Hunter outpost.

“Monica, hear you got work for me,” you greeted when you reached the meeting point, the men with her turning to face you only a second before a blonde blur launched himself at you.  _“Oof!_ ”

“When we heard about the city – I mean we saw the smoke – “ Prompto pulled away from the tight hug he just about tackled you into, excited to see you were safe and alive, as Gladio and Ignis greeted you themselves.  They weren’t quite as enthusiastic, but you sort of appreciated that.

“Long time, no see,” Gladio welcomed with a clap on your back as Ignis retained a respectful distance, though was happy to see you, nonetheless.

“What can I say?  War is a busy time,” you shrugged off casually, Prompto stepping back to give you some space just before you ducked to your side a bit to look at Monica, “Speaking of which, I heard there’s a blockade that needs our attention?”

“Yes, we will act as a distraction attacking head-on while the marshal and prince slip in and eliminate the remaining threat inside,” Monica answered simply, the absence of both Cor and Noctis making it clear that they’d already left for their part in the strike.  The four of you coordinated a bit, Monica called Cor to let him know you’d arrived and the four of you were moving out, and then you were on your way to the front gate of the blockade.  You ducked behind a few bushes, tucking your bag away for the time being, and taking count of the soldiers out front.

“Alright, you guys go ahead and cause a ruckus, get as many out here as you can,” you laid out a plan, “I’ll need a few minutes to get things ready, but when I tell you to fall back you’ve gotta run like hell.”

“What are you gonna do?” Prompto couldn’t help but ask, he’d never seen a Glaive in action before.  Though, to be fair, those that had only saw you and the others in the training grounds.  Fighting on the field was entirely different, partially because there was a limit on the kinds of spells you could cast in the training grounds.

“It’ll be easier if I show you.”

 

********

 

To say Noctis had some anger to work out would be an understatement.

On the surface, it looked like he’d cooled down, but he’d been carrying a façade – wearing a mask – for others since he was a kid, and it didn’t help that part of his frustration was with Cor.  The marshal said that Luna was alive and safe, a Glaive was with her, and another Glaive had been the one to give that report.  What the marshal _didn’t_ say was who _either_ of the Glaives were, where Luna was or where she was heading, or if he’d heard anything about –

It’s not like the prince could just _ask_ about you, but you’d been assigned to guard the Citadel last he knew, and it was safe to reason that was the main setting for most of the action – at least at the start.  Knowing you, you were right in the thick of it all.  Still, you were good, all reports pointed to you being able of both doing and surviving the impossible.  You’d even successfully cheated death.  If anyone could survive that…that mess…

You were resourceful.  Even if you’d lost your magic when the king died, as every Glaive would have, your ability to survive and adapt was something you’d had long before you became a Glaive.  Long before you’d even met _Noctis_ or even _arrived_ in Insomnia at all.  You were clever, even if you didn’t know exactly what you were doing, you’d figure it out.

You were fine, you’d be fine, and Noctis would continue to tell himself that until he actually believed it.

Even as his thoughts continued to wander – despite his continued attempts to redirect and focus them – clearing out the Magitech soldiers remaining after the distraction the others were causing cleared out most of the numbers.  Cor was in the middle of saying he felt more comfortable sending the prince on a quest to visit the remaining tombs of his ancestors when things on the other side of the blockade got a bit more… _lively_ than Noctis had expected.

Particularly because of the telltale signs of a wide-ranged Thundaga being cast, strong enough for the scorch marks left behind on the ground to spread underneath the blockade and paint the asphalt road and parts of the surrounding grass a pitch black.

Noctis had been fiddling around with Elemancy since they arrived in Hammerhead, he much preferred locking a spell into a capsule to toss like a magical grenade instead of raw spellwork – there was an exhausting amount of focus, concentration, and finicky details involved even for use outside of battle – but he certainly hadn’t handed any spells off to the guys.  It had been a while since he worked with any Elemancy, let alone on the level a casting like that would require, and he wasn’t about to just _hand_ something like that off without being completely sure he knew what it would do.

The heavy metal gates slid open, and Noctis was… _conflicted_ about what – who – he saw.

You were safe, the fear of your demise no longer a leaden weight in his gut, but there were…

Well…you were _there_.  The last time the two of you had spoken things weren’t exactly comfortable.  Then there was the spellcasting you had just done, and with the Ring of Lucii with Luna…

Noctis honestly couldn’t tell which possible explanation he feared most, that the two of you were secretly related and never knew, which would quickly lead to some permanent mental scarring that - according to Oedipus - would lead to the prince prying out his own eyes, or something far more complicated was going on.


	8. EXplanations Can Be EXtra Awkward

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Woohoo! Chapter 8 is here!!
> 
> So, as y'all have noticed and as I know I've warned before, this is taking a bit cause this project does involve replaying FFXV (boohoo for me, I know lol) and since I'm a perfectionist, that also involves doing so many side-quests that I get to level 50 before I even go collect Titan. I'm not even kidding. Did that on my last playthrough too. I'm your classic RPG player that goes and does ALL THE SHIT before getting on with the story, which is 100% why I headcanon that the story of FFXV - if we're assuming Noct 100%-ed his adventure - took a year/year and a half.
> 
> Also, a question to anyone whose posted stuff anywhere online, am I the only one that gets spam comments? I got one on an MCU fic that's clearly tagged as a Reader/Steve but I got a spam comment where the gist was Ultron is pro Stony, so either I kill Ultron or kill off the reader (which the commenter said would cause cheers across the US) so Stony can be a thing. Like...do people wake up and decide they're gonna do this? I mean, it's SUPER easy to filter out the fics you wanna read based on the ships, and I worry about undertagging so I tag everything I can even at the risk of spoilers, and the summary doesn't give the impression that it's a Stony fic. Like, if you don't like the fic then post (constructive) criticism or hit back. I'm not saying I've never said stupid shit in comments, I did shit I'm not proud of in my youth, but spamming certainly isn't one of them.
> 
> Seriously, though, I'm honestly curious about the thought process. I'm not even bothered, I just really want to know if it's impulsive or they decide to spam a whole bunch of people with the same thing at the same time. I'm not a psychology expert, I do have to know some Behavioral Psychology to help my sister with her multiple struggles I'm 100% certain are because she's so bright but can't communicate but all my knowledge is from basic psych classes and the rest entirely surrounds my sister's needs with basic knowledge as needed, but I still feel like there's an entire psychological study to be done there.
> 
> What can I say? Pottermore might insist I'm a Gryffindor, but I KNOW I'm a Ravenclaw at heart.
> 
> Finally, I know there's a lot of places where the drinking age is 20/21, but for literary purposes it's 18 in Eos.
> 
> EDIT: I forgot the Chapter Title field again. I tend to save titling until I'm ready to post, which is why I keep forgetting the Chapter Title field.

# For Hearth And Home

### EXplanations Can Be EXtra Awkward

 

 _“[Y/N], I want you to go with the prince,”_ Cor had said after the lot of you had cleared out the blockade’s reinforcements, including the Imperial Prince Loqi in his mech, _“We don’t know what he’ll face beyond the Niffs, and you’re much more familiar with the world beyond Insomnia’s walls.”_

Cor didn’t need to _say_ it, at least not out loud, but you were also the one with a best chance at making contact with Luna – more specifically _Nyx_ – and any word from her would need to be immediately relayed to Noctis.  Then there was the fact the Niffs suspected every Glaive lost their magic when the king died and wouldn’t expect to be facing a mage.

 _“Can’t argue with that logic,”_ you’d replied with a shrug, successfully shoving down the anxiety already bubbling up in your stomach.  You and Noctis would have to have a few words, in private, sooner or later.  That was exactly how the two of you ended up speaking, alone, at Wiz’s Chocobo Outpost, after tossing your bag into the Regalia’s trunk and making a pit stop at the Aster Slough rest stop before continuing on to the Chocobo Outpost for the night.

Prompto was utterly _enthralled_ by the Chocobos, surrounded by a handful of baby Chocobos as he sat on the ground and played with them, after he’d jumped up _frighteningly_ early that morning with a level of excitement even Ignis and Gladio thought was inhuman for that hour of day.  Speaking of the Shield and Advisor were visiting the shop.  Ignis, specifically, was looking through food supplies while Gladio was looking through the shop’s curatives.  That was the _story_ at any rate, though it was more likely they suspected Noctis wanted to ask you for _details_ regarding the fall of Insomnia and decided to – for lack of a better word – _skedaddle._

Prompto was probably still entirely drawn by the baby birds, to be entirely honest _you_ wanted to go play with the chirping little balls of yellow feathers, but you knew Noctis was going to want to talk even before he woke up at a decent time without being rousted.

You’d dug out an oversized black t-shirt from your bag and tucked it into your high-waisted shorts, blousing it out a bit so the red _Hunter_ symbol from _Bloodborne_ wasn’t distorted, and wrapped a black and white plaid flannel around your waist.  You’d already done your makeup and run a brush through your hair by the time Noctis was climbing down from the top bunk of the set of bunk beds built into the back of the camper, and you were slipping your black sneakers over your ankle-high socks as he was getting up and ready for the day himself.

As you reached for the knob to the door, you were cut off when you heard the prince _whistle_ like a dog-owner trying to get their pup’s attention, and as you turned to give him an equally aghast and _offended_ look he was just snapping his fingers a few times before pointing to the small couch you’d crashed on the night before.  The prick hadn’t even looked up from rifling through his own duffle bag of clothes for a clean t-shirt, though he had slipped into a pair of jeans which led you to believe he hadn’t even looked up from putting on his pants to see if you were heading towards the fucking door.

You took a deep breath through your nose, reminded yourself that as a Kingsglaive with no captain and no king the closest thing you _had_ to a boss was the infuriating prince, and sat down on the couch with a huff.  He had questions, likely questions regarding just what had happened in Insomnia, and you had answers.  You’d been planning on giving him privacy to get dressed, the same privacy you’d had in the knowledge the prince was dead to the world, but apparently once you see him nude he just _doesn’t care._

You were still mad at him for _guilt tripping_ you like that back in Insomnia.  Now he had the nerve to angrily yank his shirt over his head like –

“How the _hell_ do you still have magic?”

That was not the question you’d been expecting him to ask first…

“I can guarantee you it’s _not_ because we’re related – “ you started off, addressing something that you – in all honesty – felt needed immediate addressing.

“That’s great, I didn’t accidently sleep with a distant cousin, now how the hell do you still have magic?”  Noctis was having none of it.  It was rare to see him lose his patience, _really_ lose his patience, or even his temper despite how competitive he was, but when he did there was no yelling, to tantrum, to fit.  Just a snippy attitude, a steady stream of sarcastic and snarky comments, a steady and almost unblinking gaze with just enough hints of red leaking in to create a _tease_ of violet, a furrowed brow, and the occasional tensed jaw.

A man who was quick to an explosive anger could easily seem intimidating to anyone who didn’t know any better, but to those who did it was the man with a long patience and a _quiet_ anger that was truly worth fearing.  Quick-tempered men with power, when they yell and scream and throw a fit, are easy to control, they’re easy to manipulate, and they’re easy to predict.  Men like Noctis, however, are impossible to predict, and the worst part was it took _so long_ to successfully anger them that when you succeeded you likely _deserved it_.  You’d seen Noctis just seemingly _let go_ of his anger before he caught _everyone_ by surprise and enacted his revenge _three weeks later._  

“I don’t know,” you admitted honestly, taking a deep breath as you struggled to find a place to start, “But I think your father did.”

Noctis took a steps back from staring you down, leaning back against the counter across from the couch and crossing his arms, silently waiting for an explanation, so…you gave it to him.  You started from the beginning, Crowe’s orders to get Luna out of Tenebrae, and ran down _everything_ that landed you to waiting for Cor outside Insomnia’s border.  To his credit, Noctis just listened, tucking any questions he had in the back of his mind for later as you’d decided to run through the _chronological_ explanation.  It was the one you could make the most sense of, the one that you could give without making things even more confusing than they already were, and even then it all seemed so… _batshit._

“I…I suppose it’s a bit too much to hope he ever said anything about some voice in the Beyond to you,” you let out a little chuckle, having shifted in your seat on the couch to cross your legs – like you were a damn _child_ – and slouched as you continued to drone on about the most hellish few _hours_ of your life.  “I mean, it seems like this whole _destiny_ thing is still news to you.”

“Luna was the only one who said anything about a _destiny_ to me, but it was only once and I was _eight_ ,” Noctis let out a sigh as he ran a tired hand through his hair, “I have no idea what you’re hearing, or why my father – why _any_ of the Lucii would think it’s important.”

“I’ll figure it out, I just need time, and you don’t need to worry about it.  I just need you to help me keep the whole – “

“The _magic should be gone_ thing a secret,” Noctis nodded in agreement, catching on quick as he took a deep breath and started running through tales he could tale.  So far, from what it seemed, you and he were the only ones who knew your magic should be _gone_ if the source truly was King Regis.  Still, it was safest to be sure, have a tale just in case.  It didn’t seem to be a secret that the two of you at least _used_ to be close, up until you went and joined the Glaives.  “Anyone in the royal family is capable of giving someone magic, just because I don’t… _exactly_ know how yet doesn’t mean I can’t.”

“And if anyone asks you, it’s easy to explain away that it’s not just _you_ but the individual’s resonance with magic as well.”  You quickly caught on to what Noctis was suggesting, just telling everyone _he_ was the one to give you magic because the two of you were close and insinuating it was a lack of time due to your respective duties that caused a drift between the two of you.

“I know it requires the ring too, if push comes to shove, we could just use that,” Noctis added in a final detail to the little… _fib_ the two of you might need to tell in case somebody asked.  The guys might ask, it would be best to fill them in on at least the _basics_ , but there were some details they should best be spared.  Your experience with the Lucii, for starters, that voice you were hearing, and for the time being it would be best not to mention the king actively _taking your magic away_ at great risk to _everyone’s_ lives.

“When did you start hearing it?”  Noctis brought up as the two of you were parting ways, you were making your way towards the door and the prince heading back to his bag to dig out a clean pair of socks and his sneakers.  The thought had struck Noctis at the last second, almost as if it was out of nowhere, but he was a _royal._   Lackadaisical appearance, tendency for naps, and habit for procrastination aside the boy – _young man_ , the both of you were 20 and you should really remember that considering you’d almost _died_ a year ago – and Noctis Lucis Caelum was _absolutely_ raised and taught to think through _everything._

Even if it meant asking the others for their opinions, advice, or if they knew anything he didn’t, Noctis was nothing if not thorough and actively frustrated if he had no way to get answers to questions.

Speaking of which…

“After a mission…I was sent in with a few warriors and we were supposed to take out a Niff base too close to our borders.”  Your voice was quiet, solemn, as you recalled the event.  It was hard not to, it had been playing vividly behind your eyes since Insomnia fell.  You’d done your damnest to shove it back, lock it away into a deep dark recess of your mind, but recalling your brief soiree into the Beyond made it _all_ come back.  “That was how we found out the Niffs were planning on bringing daemons into the field on top of their fiends, and I had to hold up a barrier to give the guys a way out.  Then the bomb went off…the explosion didn’t hit me but – “

“But the debris landed on you.  Four cracked ribs, a broken rib that pierced your lung, dislocated shoulder, sprained ankle, concussion, and a broken nose,” Noctis listed it off like he’d had it all memorized, still bent over with his foot leaning against the edge of the bottom bunk as he tied his shoe, pausing for a minute to list of your previous injuries before finishing the final knot on his shoe, “Yeah.  I know.”

“Well…um…”  You had to take a moment to sort of…work through the fact that Noctis not only memorized the list of injuries that almost killed you, but it was during a time he would have had to search through your records to see how you were doing.  “It took them a few moments to resuscitate me, and during that time I was in the Beyond for a bit…I guess I was too hopped up on IV pain meds when I was in the hospital, but when my head cleared up a bit…I got closer to the Crystal during the commendation ceremony in the throne room and she reached out for the first time.  I heard her clearer when someone put on the ring, which makes sense since they’re supposed to be dead in the Beyond – or a pocket of it – and if the voice is coming from the Beyond itself and I’m hearing it because I’m connected to it…or her…I don’t know.”

“It’s a place to start, I guess,” Noctis sighed, standing upright after tying his second shoe and stretching his back a bit before digging out an old pair of black fingerless gloves from his bag.

Maybe you should have told him of the black figure you’d seen, the light that called to you, but…

No, it was all too much already, and he had his own problems.  Unless you had some kind of proof, you didn’t want to go around spreading stories that could imply there’s some sort of monster corrupting the Beyond itself.  Everything was much too complicated, too surreal, as it was.  That…nightmarish thing being added into the mix was just extra weight you couldn’t dump until you had some sort of explanation.

“Hey, hold up,” Noctis stopped you one last time, catching up to you before going about finishing his morning routine, “I know you probably don’t use weapons a lot, but it’ll be easier to point-warp if you can just grab a dagger from the Armiger.”

“Right, right.”  To be entirely honest, that hadn’t been something you thought of, but Noctis had a good point.  You let him take your hand, from what you’d seen that wasn’t exactly necessary but he also didn’t have to fiddle around with foreign magic when he connected Iggy and Gladio to the Armiger years ago, and both felt and _saw_ the slight burst of blue magic in your palm when the connection was made.  It was a bit odd, like a tether at your wrist that was wasn’t connected to anything, but considering the theory and technicalities behind what a connection to the Armiger would mean, it made sense.

The two of you left the camper separately, you reached the round table the others were sitting at long enough before the prince that you were reaching for the sugar and powdered creamer to mix into your coffee when he arrived.  You sort of doubted you could get your regular coffee order, Vanilla Caramel latte, at the outpost.  Honestly, you suspected the only places you’d reliably find that outside Insomnia were Lestallum, Hammerhead, and Galdin Quay.

Speaking of Galdin Quay, you couldn’t help but wonder if there was still that small village near the resort.  Galahd’s healthiest trade route ran through Galdin Quay and a few Galahdans moved to the Lucian mainland long before the Niffs invaded.  Most refugees ran straight for Insomnia, as anywhere outside the Crown City was _technically_ still a territory and something about seeing an invading force burning down your home makes you seek the comfort of _walls_ , but there were likely some that ran right to Galdin.

“Great!  You’re up!”  Prompto had been practically hopping in his seat as he waited for Noctis to arrive, baseball cap pulled over the prince’s eyes in an attempt at a disguise you had to admit might actually work in the wildlands that made up most of Lucis.  “So, Wiz can’t let any of the Chocobos out cause there’s this nasty fiend making things too dangerous.  He put out a contract on it – “

“You want us to take the contract to ride the Chocobos,” Noctis sat back, he might nap a lot but he tended to wake up pretty quickly, “I’ll take a look at it in a bit, alright?”

Prompto felt comfortable enough to cheer, taking that as an absolute win.

 

********

 

The hunt payed decently, a little over 3,000 gil, which made sense considering it was for a Behemoth.  An _old_ Behemoth, to be specific, which was about as dangerous as they got.  Younger Behemoths were large and vibrant, but they were reckless and easy to taunt and trap.  Older Behemoths were more experienced, slower but practiced, patient, and knew what they were doing.  Worse yet, based on the picture on the wanted poster, this one – _Deadeye –_ had survived losing a horn and use of one eye and still managed to mark off a large area as _its territory._

Either way, it wasn’t a long trek until you first heard the deep rumbling growl.

“The hell?” Gladio voiced the question on just about everyone’s mind, quiet and cautious, as the five of you slammed to a halt along the pathway.

“Something’s amiss,” Ignis observed, everyone’s attention brought to the trees being swayed and _cracked_ by whatever gave out that growl.

“Unless there’s another Behemoth in the area, I’d say that’s it,” you wagered as the five of you started making tracks once again, though you were sure to grab one of the hairbands hanging at your wrist to tie your long brown hair up into a messy bun once again.  You’d fought a few of them, never alone and never one as old – or big as the ones the Niffs had under control were all still rather young – as this Deadeye.  “Definitely _sounds_ like one.”

“You seen one before?” Prompto asked, jogging a bit to catch up as he’d paused a bit longer than the rest of you.

“Yeah, Niffs used them a lot before they figured out how to weaponize daemons.”  It was a simple enough answer, one you honestly didn’t think about as you gave it.  You’d been living every day surrounded by fellow Glaives, most of which had been at the job longer than you, and anyone else had either been beyond the wall repeatedly or was born and raised beyond it.  In short, the sort of filters you’d put up when you were last with the guys were all _gone._   “Never big ones, once the Behemoths get too big and mature, they’re impossible to control, but if you get a bunch of young ones, shoot them up with adrenaline, and point them in a direction and it’s basically the same as sending a bunch of Iron Giants.”

There was a brief silence, and the fact that even _Gladio_ was silent let you know that your old _Insomnia Filter_ wasn’t as intact as you thought it was, and you sort of felt like you needed to add, “It’s not like I was taking them on _alone.”_

“Yeah, but there’s not a lot of Glaives, right?  Like, there never have been,” Prompto pointed out immediately afterwards, punching a hole in any _damage control_ you might have done.

“That is true, the Glaives numbers have never exceeded two-dozen.”

You were going to punch Ignis right in his unnecessary glasses.

It’s not like you wanted to pretend everything was _just like before_ – with the addition that you had magic and knew how to fight – but you didn’t need them hearing about _everything_ you’d done and thinking you were someone _completely_ different.  The basics of your personality were still the same.

You _hoped_ so anyway.


	9. Time's Effect On People Makes It Impossible To Get The 'Old' Band Back Together

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Kinda short, compared to some others, and a bit of a filler, I know. However, as I hope you guys know, I'm not big on fillers unless they have a reason. This one, while it doesn't further the plot itself, it does play a part in how the guys act with/around Rea and hopefully gives a bit of a glimpse into her past with them.
> 
> The Deadeye quest is legit one of my fave side quests.
> 
> So, that’s one of the ones we’re going into detail with.
> 
> We’re not going into detail with ALL the side-quests because that would literally never end, but many will be mentioned, some will be addressed in further detail if I find it necessary or find a good way to fit it into the fic – like using the Deadeye quest as a sort of ‘hey guyz, I know you thought working with Rea was gonna be basically the same as before, but she was holding her shit back at the blockade so she didn’t spook y’all and she can’t do that shit forever.’
> 
> Since Rea’s history with the guys is a big part of this fic, I kinda feel like it’s necessary to do that. Partially cause, for this fic, I’m trying a new method that involves approaching the past relationships and histories between characters as flashbacks and in bits and pieces. Basically, giving the ‘After’ first, and then the ‘Before.’ IDK, I have an Original fic I’ve been working on since middle school, it’s been re-written repeatedly and I’ve even swapped a few roles like the badass was supposed to have a background with a villain while the clever jokester was supposed to be the heir to a throne but they swapped places and the application of magic has been minimized, but I wanna use that same sort of approach when I’m done building the world and start actually writing.
> 
> I basically have three parts planned for the Original story and while it should be read 1, 2, 3, the chronological order will be 2, 1, 3.
> 
> When I do finally finish this project, cause it's gonna be a while and I'm willing to bet it's also gonna be longer than SoF, I might do a shorter 'prologue' fic to sort of give more detailed insight into Rea's past with the guys. I did also come up with the idea that I'd end this fic only half-way through the 'main game,' post a part 2 in a series that would focus her past in Galahd, life in Insomnia, and history with the guys - especially with Noct - before the war, and then go into a part 3 which wraps up the story. That would be a MASSIVE project though, and I don't know if I have the time/energy to do that, and I haven't worked out a good place to cut off if I'm gonna do that. I mean, the part where Noct goes into the Crystal is WAY too late, an argument could be made for Altissia, but I want Rea to be in the depth of actually getting answers at the end of the part 1. Like legit about to get them right at the end, but there are complications with that I can't share cause spoilers. However, it would turn the whole thing into bite-sized chunks I would be able to work with in quicker progression and - hopefully - make it easier to read than a single fic with over 100,000 words.
> 
> I'll figure it out.
> 
> Also, Liliana is an OC. Y’all probably figured that, but just wanted to say that cause it’s better to be safe than sorry.

# For Hearth And Home

### Time's Effect On People Makes It Impossible To Get The 'Old' Band Back Together

 

The decision had been a logical one, Gladio knew that considering _he’d_ been the one that made it, but the idea of hovering over the others while leaving you to act on your own felt _wrong._

Last he’d seen you, your eyes seemed so much bigger and brighter, but maybe you’d just been better at hiding it.  As he got older…when he’d met a Glaive trainee named Liliana Alta from Galahd, he’d seen something in those big green eyes he didn’t quite recognize until he noticed it in his father’s eyes, Cor’s eyes, even the king, and he’d seen that same shadow in Cid’s eyes as well.  Liliana was still training, she couldn’t have seen action as a Glaive, but in escaping from Galahd…Gladio heard _stories_ , but he’d rarely gone beyond the borders of Insomnia himself.

Perhaps you were just better at _hiding_ it, carrying that weight of those memories on your own, or maybe you just didn’t feel like you _had_ to anymore.

Either way, there was a dark shadow in your big brown eyes, one that only people who had seen war and _real_ battle carried.  Even your steps through the grass were expertly made, but you’d always been light on your feet…you’d always been good at sneaking around.  You’d even managed to sneak up on _him_ a few times, teased him for being too engrossed in his book, but maybe he hadn’t thought it through.  For as much advice he gave the others, he was only a few years older, it was more likely he’d just _missed_ something two years ago than him overthinking things _now._

The only entrance to Deadeye’s territory was through a small tunnel made through a bunch of debris lying around, and there were moments you were carefully brushing the ground and wall with your fingertips, but even when you shot a ball of ice past the Behemoth and against a rock across a clearing to draw its attention elsewhere, you were _worryingly_ capable.

“It’s weak on the right,” Gladio observed when everyone was out of the tunnel of old walls and aluminum paneling, Deadeye’s attention pulled away somewhere comfortably far away, “No eye, no horn.”

“We’ll stay in range until we can exploit it,” Ignis laid out the best plan, and in many cases you’d agree, but with a single enemy in their own comfort zone that might not be the best approach.

“It would be easier to _make_ an opening than wait for one,” you mentioned, looking back as you seemed to be moving a bit faster than the others, far more used to things like this.  Depending on the outcome of operation, how many Glaives were involved, and of course how quickly a report needed to be made, it wasn’t unusual for the returning soldiers to complete a quick hunt or two on the way back – work out the rest of the adrenaline so you weren’t a batch of hooting and hollering fools during the long drive home.  “He’s gotten smarter with age and his lair is going to be set up for his ease and comfort, we might not be able to _wait_.”

“Are there any specific weakness you know of?” Ignis questioned, as was his tendency.  He gathered information to recall later, if he didn’t know something, he’d ask someone he did.

Though, Ignis hadn’t considered he’d be asking _you_ for advice on a foe.  You’d always been clever, that was evident by the fact you were a refugee who managed to test and talk her way into a _private_ school on a scholarship.  That takes a bit of trickery, something Ignis blamed the system for entirely and not you, but you managed to wear the proper masks at the proper time through all four years of high school.  You read people, remarkably correctly, and applied that knowledge quickly and adequately.  It was something, he began to recall, you’d so _briefly_ and _lightheartedly_ mentioned was due to a _lifetime_ as an orphan that even _he_ forgot that detail.

With everything in perspective, clicking properly into place, it all fit.  You’d been reading weaknesses and taking advantage of them your entire life, but to be asking the girl who loved to dance and took every optional art class she could wiggle into her schedule for advice on how to handle a deadly enemy and kill them before they killed the rest of you…

“Big guys like him don’t like fire.”  You didn’t even stop as you hopped onto the trunk of a fallen tree, it was hardly large, but you paused to look around before continuing on.  “Keep moving, they’re faster than they look, and they move kinda like really big _cats_.”

“Cats?”  Prompto’s attention was specifically nabbed by that point, though he had been listening to the entire thing, “Really?”

“It’ll make sense when you see it.”

On one hand, you were right about the whole _moving like a cat_ thing, on the other hand Prompto was a bit busy focusing on not getting swatted by the thing’s _massive paws_ to put much more thought into it, let alone make a comment.  That _fire_ tip was helpful, mostly for Noctis as he threw encapsulated fire at the beast and gave the guys an opening to wail on Deadeye before making a mad retreat.  You managed a few pot-shots of fire yourself, but you were also focused on keeping a sturdy Protega maintained on all four of the guys plus yourself.

That was some serious battlefield management.  Cor had spent _months_ hammering that into Prompto’s head before they even got to that could be called ‘real training,’ and even then, Cor kept harping on it.  To be fair to the marshal, battlefield management could easily make the difference between victory and absolutely disaster – whether anyone survived or not – and it was absolutely worth remembering.  The thing was, _everyone_ had seen what happens when a magic user overuses their magic without rest or an Ether. 

You’d all seen Noctis after a long day practicing magic with his father, practically dead to the world and so tired he could barely make it to his apartment couch without completely collapsing, and Noct had _tried_ explaining the details of spellwork only to get confused himself.  There was the energies bit, the whole bit with the dormant magic in everything, the merging and mixing, then the controlling, and that was jut the basics.  Yet, there you were, doing all that while dodging Deadeye, managing everyone’s protective barriers, and pulling off the occasional shot of your own, and then _walking it off_ like you hadn’t been using a shit-ton of magic for the better part of _two hours._   Granted, you were tired like the rest of them, but you weren’t collapsing from overusing your magic because – as you’d revealed later – you’d managed to slip in applying an Ether to _‘be on the safe side’_ and make sure you weren’t over exhausting your magic.

Gladio had mentioned he’d seen some of the training Glaives went through, visiting Liliana for a quick lunch or even picking her up for a date, and said even after they’d completed basic training, they kept running some pretty brutal drills.  They’d help out with general Citadel functions where they could, but most of their time was just spent on going to war, and when they weren’t _at war_ they were _preparing to go back._

As the five of you walked back, Prompto felt himself falling behind as he held the back of his left hand with his right, his thumb slipping under the band around his wrist and hem of his glove as he suddenly felt himself so _conscious_ of the tattoo that lay there.

What…what would you do if you knew?  What would _any_ of you do if you knew?

“Prompto, chop-chop!” Noctis called after his best friend to hurry up, “You’re the one that wanted to ride the Chocobos in the first place!”

“Coming!”

 

********

 

The entire point of the hunt had been to free up the Chocobos, so you weren’t surprised the guys washed up and patched themselves up to go right to the birds.  You were the last one to finish washing up, you were all taking advantage of that while you still could even though it was a tiny shower in a camper, and you’d simply taken a seat at one of the tables at the Outpost instead of dashing to the Chocobos.  It’s not like you weren’t tempted, you’d stopped to pet a few of the babies on your way to a seat under the shade of a large umbrella, but you were already sifting through your phone.

There were a few ways Nyx would reach out to you, and it took a bit to check just a few of them let alone all of them.  You doubted he would have reached out so early, even if he’d had the chance to it was still a risky time to be opening a line of communication, the Niffs would still be closely monitoring any communication that _might_ have to do with the Oracle.  Granted, you and Nyx were only willing to use these lines of communication on the safe assumption the Niffs didn’t _know_ about them, but you were Glaives.  You were trained.  You weren’t going to _take chances_ unless there were no other options.

You couldn’t help but look up and smile a bit as you watched the guys, even Ignis had cracked his shell and started laughing as one of the Chocobos got a _bit_ enthusiastic about the greens Noct was offering it.

_Enjoy…peaceful…while…last…_

How could you enjoy _anything_ while you were losing the war, the enemy had successfully invaded, the man you were _trying_ to get back on the throne had some sort of destiny he didn’t know anything about, you had a talent for magic you should have, and a voice in your head speaking to you from the Beyond?

Yeah, relaxing and _smelling the proverbial roses_ wasn’t exactly something you were going to be doing in the near future.


End file.
